
Class i J r\ ^-^ ^ 

Book__ ^ 

PRESENTED BV 



Development 



OF THE 

Free Public High School 

IN ILLINOIS TO 1860 

PAUL E. BELTING 
II 

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of 

Doctor Philosophy, in the Faculty of Philosophy, 

Columbia University 

1919 



Published by 

ILLINOIS STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL 

Springfield 

1919 






ScHNEPP & Barnes, Printers 

Springfield, III. 

1920. 

22747 — 100 



Gift 

0"niverelt7 



D 



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. 



The author is under obligations to Dr. Paul Monroe for 
suggesting the subject investigated and the interpretation of 
facts as well as a critical reading of the manuscript ; to Dr. W. 
H. Kilpatrick for helpful suggestions ; to Dr. M. R. Trabue for 
a careful reading of the entire manuscript ; to Dr. I. L. Kandel 
for helpful criticism; and to his wife for assistance in the 
preparation of the material. 

The author is especially indebted to the county clerks of 
the older Illinois counties for permitting the use of old 
records; to the New York Public Library for the use of doc- 
umentary material ; to the Mercantile Library in St. Louis for 
the use of the J. M. Peck collection of newspapers; to Mrs. 
Jessie Palmer Weber and her assistants of the Dlinois State 
Historical Library for kindness and courtesy shown in making 
available all the resources of the State Historical Library; and 
to the Illinois Historical Society for the publication of the 
dissertation. 

P. E. B. 



THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE HIGH SCHOOL IN 

ILLINOIS. 

CONTENTS. 

Pakt I — The Academy. 

CHAPTER. PAGE. 

I. Historical Background — 

Migration and Settlement; the Northwest Ordi- 
nances ' 

II. Early Education in Illinois — 

Individual and Isolated Attempts to Establish 

Schools 1^ 

III. Administrative Organization and Support 27 

IV. Eeligious Influence — 

Catholic ; Baptist; Methodist ; Presbyterian ; 
Congregational ^1 

V. Some Internal Features — 

Admission; Tuition; Subjects of Study; Ex- 
aminations 5^ 

VI. Manual Labor Aspect — 

Origin; Philosophy; Examples; Later Influence 77 

Part II — The Common School. 

VII. The Apprenticeship System — 

Features; Indenture Records; Relation to 
Slavery 90 

Vni. The Free School Law of 1825— 

Pro-slavery Struggle; Provisions; Authorship; 
Influence of Jefferson ; Free School Districts ; 
AnnuUment— Support of Common Schools 
Afterwards "" 



CONTENTS— Concluded. 

CHAPTER. PAGE. 

TX. The Movement of 1835— 108 

Political Platforms; Survey of the State; Me- 
morials; Proposal for Normal Schools — Teach- 
ers — Wages. 

X. Some Agencies that Aided in the Development 

and Establishment of the Common School — . . . 120 

Leaders; Literary Agencies; Institutions; Con- 
ventions. 

XI. The Free School Law of 1855— 141 

Defeat of Free Schools in the Constitutional Con- 
vention; Provisions; Attitude Toward Free 
Schools. 

Xn. The Beginninsfs and the Characteristics of the 

Free Public High School by 1860— 155 

Gradation; Reorganization of Acadamies; High 
Schools Subjects of Study; Admission to High 
School; Taxation; Public School Boards. 

XTTT. The Establishment of the Free Public High 

School— 174 

Township High Schools; School Districts Under 
Special Charter; School Districts Established 
by General Law Legal Decisions. 

XIV. A Summary of Some Earlier Influences Affecting 

Later Development and Practice 187 

XV. Summary and Conclusion 195 



CHAPTER I. 



Historical Backgrotj:^?©. 

Migration and Settlement. 
Illinois was first organized as a county of the State of 
Virginia in 1778. The legislature of the mother state gave 
the territory the name of Illinois, appointed John Todd the 
first lieutenant governor to take charge of its civil and mili- 
tary affairs but ceded the territory to the confederation m 
1784. In 1809, Illinois was organized as a separate territory 
with Ninian Edwards, Chief Justice of Kentucky, the 
governor, appointed by President Madison. This office Mr. 
Edwards held until he was elected to the United States Senate 
in 1818, at which time Illinois became a state populated by 
emigrants from the older states. 

Migration from the eastern to the western states has 
usually followed the parallels of latitude. Illinois is an ex- 
cellent example of such a tendency. The State is about four 
hundred miles in length, and the parallels which bound it on 
the north and south include between them the Atlantic States 
from New Hampshire to North Carolina. Northern Illinois, 
therefore, was settled by people from Massachusetts and 
other New England and eastern states, while southern Illinois 
got its population from Virginia and the South. 

The southern half of the state with the river and timber 
areas was settled first. The pioneer hunter was driven farther 
inland by a second class, the small farmer, who, m turn, had 
to advance before the large land-owner whose purpose was to 
cultivate the land, build a home for a big family, and become a 
permanent resident of the country. 

From Kentuckv, Tennessee and Virginia came the more 
enlightened class of southerners, among whom were such lead- 
ers as Reynolds, Edwards and Coles. These men 
possessed great political wisdom and legal talent often rising 
to positions of importance and prominence in the State and 



Nation. Their followers were keen, intelligent men, both 
progressive and conservative at the same time. All classes, 
however, were kind and hospitable to stranger and friend 
alike, but once aroused, they were "bitter, vindictive and 
passionate opponents in business or politics. Strong in their 
conviction and prejudices, persistent in the maintenance of 
existing ideals and institutions, they were the champions of 
justice, equity and freedom of speech and action."^ 

The ''poor whites," so called, came from the Carolinas 
and Georgia. They were usually ignorant, obstinate, and 
shiftless.^ To gain their desires, many times dishonest and 
unscrupulous means were used. Wages were low and times 
were hard so that in the bitter struggle to earn a livelihood, 
ruthless measures were often adopted, without regard for 
principle. Some of them therefore, constituted one of the 
elements in the lawless gangs that harrassed places in the 
wealthier districts of frontier society. 

Until 1830, Illinois was almost entirely settled by men 
from the South who brought with them their political ideals, 
laws, manners, customs and traditions. It was southern law 
that formed the model for the territorial code. They were the 
ones who made the constitution of 1818. Slavery was a south- 
ern institution which the convention of 1824 tried to adopt. 
The first free school law which was passed was southern in 
origin but it was also the South which caused its revocation. 

Instead of a gradual settlement by classes as had been 
in the south, the hunter, the small hold-farmer, and the large 
land-owner, men of all classes came rapidly to every part of 
the State, and especially to the north after 1830. With steam 
navigation came the merchant, the farmer, the artisan, the 
preacher and schoolmaster, each equipped to contribute his 
share in creating a new civilization immediately in the new 
country. Dwellings, business houses, factories, churches and 
schools were erected at the same time. Danger from Indian 
Wars was over, the prairie land needed no clearing, hence 
the only requisite before wealth could come as the result of 
industry, was the means of transportation to furnish a market 
for products. 



• Harris, Negro Servitude in Illinois, p. 16. 
' Bog-gress, Settlement of Illinois, p. 123. 



9 

The Causes for Migration. 

At least two reasons induced people to migrate to Illinois. 
The first were general, influences that affected tlie whole 
country. The second were local, influences that afl'ected 
special regions. 

Many of the American people have shown a restless and 
migratory spirit.' Ever have they been dissatisfied with 
existing conditions which they thought could be improved_ in 
a country where farms were cheap and land was fertile. AVith 
reasonable labor a better living, at least, could be made. 

Business men had in several instances failed at home. 
The wilderness West offered a place of refuge for them. 
Farm laborers with low wages had learned how to farm. The 
western lands presented an opportunity for some of them to 
make a better living. Comparative land values were influen- 
tial. Large tracts of land could be had in the West cheaper 
than small farms in the East. 

ATter 1820, western lands sold for $1.25 per acre in plots 
as small as 80 acres, both of which were decided inducements 
for western settlement. The Foote Resolution in the House 
in 1829 was an inquiry which sought to find out whether the 
sale of public lands so rapidly was advisable because the 
laborers in the East were going West, thus taking them from 
infant industrv which ought to be protected. Even Henry 
Clay, in 1834, Reported unfavorably the advisability of ced- 
ing public land to the state in which it lay because the older 
states would lose by migration much of their population and 
wealth in land rewards offered by the new states. 

Moreover, the new settlers painted glowing pictures of 
the western pioneer. The latter sent letters and circulars to 
the East showing the wonderful advantages in the new 
Utopia. Restless and dissatisfied easteners began to feel that 
the day when all western land was taken up was at hand. 
Speculators sent exaggerated reports of rapidly growing 
cities. Plots of new towns were shown in the East, unsold 
lots were offered at high prices. Newspapers showed the 
advantages the West held for the laborers and small farmers 
with little capital. * Soon products from the West would 
under-sell home produce in its own market. 

» Abstract of seventh census, 1850, p. 15, showed that nearly 23% of the white 
Inhabitants of the United States at that time had migrated from the state in which 
they were born. 

* Buffalo Commercial Advertiser, March 24, 1846. 



10 

Competition among the eastern states for improvements 
to benefit their cities gave easy communication to the West. 
Frequently inhabitants along the routes of travel were stim- 
ulated to move. Many of those along the canals who 
remained were undersold in their own markets by the west- 
erner. Either they had to sell and go West or reduce their 
standard of living. 

When the water routes, the Erie Canal, the Great Lakes 
and the Ohio River, were navigated by the steamboat, incon- 
veniences were reduced and the cost of transportation was 
within reach of the poorest. An important factor in the 
rapid settlement of the West, therefore, was steam naviga- 
tion: ''Of all the elements of prosperity of the West, of all 
the causes of its rapid increase in population, its growth in 
wealth, resources and the improvement of its immense com- 
merce and gigantic energies, the most efficient has been the 
navigation by steam. ' ' * 

Lastly, speculation in western land from 1834 to 1840 was 
one element in the period of financial depression the country 
over. Sometimes eastern speculators, believing fortunes 
were to be had in western land, bought lots at high prices, 
though these were still under water or in the woods. Laborers 
were also involved in the depression. Combinations and 
unions were formed by laborers in some of the principal indus- 
tries.^ High wages were demanded to meet the higher prices 
which were 85 per cent higher in October, 1836, than in April, 
1834.® Strikes resulted from the refusal to grant higher wages 
with a ten-hour day, and several of the principal cities had 
labor troubles from 1834 to 1837.^ Employers could not meet 
the laborers' demands. The hours were reduced, then wages, 
but prices remained high. The New York Era, September 5, 
1837, says, "we can state on the best authority that in the 
eastern states nine-tenths of the factories have been stopped 
and the same proportion of men, women and children thrown 
out of employment. ' ' Riots occurred, but the most noticeable 
result was that the "army of the unemployed went West to 



* Memorial of People of Cincinnati, 1844, p. 28. 

» Ship carpenters, painters, masons, tailors, shoemakers, factory hands, harness 
makers. 

•Tale Review, v. 1, p. 94. 

' Philadelphia, Boston, Hartford, Washington, Trenton, Cincinnati, Louisville, 
St. Louis, Natchez. 



11 

take up the heritage of the poor man, cheap hinds in a new 
country. ' ' * 

Of the local causes for migration, curiosity drove many 
of the New Englanders up the rivers of their own states in the 
earlier times and later, the desires for better land sent many 
of their descendants across the mountains to Michigan, Wis- 
consin and Illinois. The soil of New England was no match 
for the fertile plains of the West. A number of the younger 
men, desiring a higher standard of living went West. Fin- 
ally, New England increased rapidly as an industrial section 
from 1840 to 1850. Wages were good and prices were high, 
but the foreign immigrant who began to come at that time 
made economic and social conditions more unbearable to the 
American laborer. Large numbers of the latter went West to 
escape, if possible, the increased limitations placed on life. 

Extremely hard times were experienced in the Middle 
States from 1834 to 1840, as the result of high prices, low 
wages, and the closing of factories. Taxes were high at the 
same time, especially among the farmers in New York, duo to 
the construction of the Erie Canal. The margin of profit was 
partly erased by the competition of w^estem farmers. Mor- 
over, property was being concentrated in the hands of large 
land-owners, which made rents higher than the cost of land 
in Illinois. 

One of the greatest causes in sending _ the southern 
emigrant North was slavery. Free labor in the South 
received 121/2 cents per day in 1832 f hence the white man was 
unable to compete with black labor. Cotton, which took much 
of the substance from the soil, was continually demanding 
new land. Moreover a growing slave population crowded out 
the small land owners and the landless. 

Moreover some of the southern states had a complaint 
against the tariff legislation of 1824 and 1828. Because of it 
he said that merchants were ruined, laborers were out of 
work, grass was growing in the streets, houses were falling, 
the price of real estate was low, rents were nothing, fields 
were abandoned and interest rates were high." 

sTale Review, v. 1, p. 99, quoted by Pooley, p. 335. 

•House Doc. — Debates — 22 Cong. I. Sess., p. 3154. , ^ . . ^ ^^ 

"Senate Debates — 22 Cong. I. Sess., p. 80, which was the beginning of the 
nullification disputes. 



12 

Finally, Ohio and Indiana, states that had been members 
of the Union for a generation or more, sent settlers to eastern 
Illinois from 1840 to 1860 because there was not enough good 
land to divide with the sons in the family who desired to 
establish homes of their own. These youths moved West to 
the rich plains of Illinois where they were content to stop to 
make their fortune." 

Economically, the settlement of Illinois has been char- 
acterized, therefore, as an attempt chiefly on the part of the 
American farmer and laborer to widen the market and raise 
the standard of living by taking advantage of the free western 
lands. 

Kailroads and lake traffic made Northern Illinois feel it- 
self a part of the North Atlantic States. Wagon roads and 
river routes created the same feeling in Southern Illinois for 
the South. Consequently, the institutions in the two sections 
closely resembled, in origin, those with which the settlers 
were acquainted in their home states. Northern Illinois devel- 
oped the free, common school system ; Southern Illinois clung 
to the academy and select school. Secondary education in the 
North, like the East, began to become democratic ; in the Soutli 
it was aristocratic. Sectionalism, then, from the transporta- 
tion period on, changed from East and West to North and 
South. 

The Northiuest Ordinances. 
The ordinances of 1785 and 1787, besides being instru- 
ments of government, constituted the first charters of the pub- 
lic school system of the United States.^^ The former reserved 
the sixteenth section of every township of public land, "for 
the maintenance of public schools within the township." The 
third article of the latter said that ''religion," morality and 
knowledge being necessary to good government and the happi- 
ness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall for- 
ever be encouraged." 



" Niles Register, v. 52, p. 114. Some names of towns in the prairie district 
of eastern Illinois are like the same in Indiana and Ohio. Earlier prairie settlers 
frequently gave Ohio and Indiana as the state of their birth. 

" After the cession of Virginia's claims to the northwestern territory was 
executed various plans of government were drawn up the next tliree years. July 
11, 1787, a committee of which Nathan Dane of Massachusetts was chairman, 
reported a plan of government for the territory northwest of the Ohio River. A 
slavery clause was added and the bill became a law July 13, 1787. Congress 
accepted the mode of government in 1789. 



13 

April 18, 1818, Congress offered to Illinois for acceptance 
or rejection. 

"1. That section numbered sixteen in every township, 
and when such section has been sold, or otherwise disposed of, 
other lands equivalent thereto, and as contiguous as may be, 
shall be granted to the state for the use of the inhabitants of 
such township for the use of schools.'* 

2. ' ' That all salt springs within such state and the lands 
reserved for the use of the same shall be granted to the said 
state, and the same to be used under such terms and conditions 
and regulations as the legislature of said state shall direct; 
provided the legislature shall never sell nor lease the same for 
a longer period than ten years at any one time." 

3. ''That five per cent of the net proceeds of the lands 
lying within such state, and which shall be sold by congress 
from and after the first day of January, one thousand eight 
hundred and nineteen, after deducting all exjDenses incident 
to the same, shall be reserved for the purposes following, viz : 
Two-fifths to be distributed under the direction of congress 
in making roads leading to the state; the residue to be ap- 
propriated by the legislature of the state for the encourage- 
ment of learning, of which one-sixth part shall be exclusively 
bestowed on a college or university." 

4. ''That thirty-six sections or one entire township, 
which shall be designated by the President of the United 
States, together with the one reserved for that purpose, shall 
be reserved for the use of a seminary of learning, and vested 
in the legislature of the said state, to be appropriated solely 
to the use of such seminary by the said legislature." " 

These provisions laid down by congress were accepted by 
Illinois, August 26, 1818, in a convention assembled at Kas- 
kaskia. 

The first three sections of the compact were carried out 
and a resolution, "that a select committee be appointed to 
draft a memorial to the President of the United States, 
requesting him to designate 36 sections of land in the State 
of Illinois, to be reserved for the use of a Seminary of Learn- 
ing in said state, in pursuance of the fourth article of the 



M Constitution of niinois, 1818, p. 22. 



14 

compact between the United States and the state of Illinois," 
was sent to the President in 1822. * 

Although land grants were made on the basis of town- 
ships or subdivisions of them, local government was managed 
by a county commissioners' court of three which resembled 
that of Virginia except that the Dlinois commissioners in 
each county were elected at large by the people. ' ' The com- 
missioners had a narrow range of discretionary power; but 
there was no power given to communities to control local 
affairs or to enact by-laws in promotion of neighborhood 
interests. ' ' " 

However, there was the germ in these congressional 
grants of land for school purposes, capable of becoming a 
highly organized township system under proper conditions. 
Deeds to land were given by the authority of the township. 
The government of the United States had set aside for the 
people of every township a section of land, the proceeds from 
which were to constitute a permanent township school fund. 
The State, moreover, made the township a body corporate 
and politic for school purposes, and gave the inhabitants of 
each township the right to maintain free schools near the 
middle of the nineteenth century. But the first school dis- 
tricts of the state followed boundaries that were laid out to 
meet the needs of a locality rather than following the lines of 
the surveyed township. The first attempts for the education 
of the children of Illinois are illustrated in the following 
chapter. 

* The President authorized Gov. Coles to select the 36 sections. The latter 
reported to the legislature, Dec. 4, 1826, that he had chosen 26, and would soon 
designate the other 10 sections. 

"Ulinois Intelligencer, Sat., Dec. 14, 1822. 



15 



CHAPTER 11. 

Early Education in Illinois. 

Frontier settlements in the United States generally have 
had two classes of people: the one, made up of the strong, 
the honest and the adventurous; the other, made up of the 
weak, the shiftless and the vicious. The former were always 
desirous of providing those opportunities for their children 
which the parents had missed themselves; the latter were 
the parasites who tried to exist with the least possible ex- 
ertion. Nowhere does this contrast stand out so sharply, as 
it does in relation to education. In the absence of established 
school systems, individual leaders provided what education 
they could for the youth. Very often the parasitic, itinerant 
individuals thought that teaching was the easiest means of 
existence. Accordingly, bombastic speeches and alluring 
advertisements were made by the soldier-of-fortune teachers 
to attract tuition pupils to their high-sounding, fashionable 
schools. A made to order education could be given to any 
child so long as the tuition was paid. Quick of growth, 
popular in name, entertaining in methods of teaching, these 
institutions preyed on the frontier communities. 

Nevertheless, the indomitable, thoroughly honest, intelli- 
gent and far-sighted missionary preachers and political lead- 
ers planned to start aright a system of education. It is true 
that their ideal, usually, was the academy, an institution in 
practice, primarily, for the education of leaders. But in 
theory, at least, its advantages should be such that the ideal 
government created by the constitution could be maintained 
by educating every child. From 1806, when the Vincennes 
Academy was established, to the time when the free public 
high school was established, the great argument advanced for 
the education of the people was that the government of the 
people, for the people, and by the people might not perish 



16 

from the earth. Had free government in Illinois depended 
on free educational provisions and opportunities for the 
common man in the early period, it most surely would have 
perished. Either leaders like Coles and Peck were educated 
in the states from whence they came, or a few academies 
in the centers of population in the frontier districts instruct- 
ed such leaders as Eeynolds and Bateman. On the whole, the 
educational system of Illinois, from 1800 to 1835, was con- 
ducted on a purely individualistic basis. 

Among the earliest plans for education in Illinois was 
that presented to the English King and Council in a petition 
by Leyman, a leader of a colony, to settle on the Mississippi 
about 1765. He says, '' Another step I would propose to be 
taken which must have great effect towards Accomplishing 
the design, is that of a Colledge, or Publick School, to be 
Established in some proper place in that Country, and em- 
powered to give honorary degrees, in Order to instruct the 
Children of the English, French and Indians, and amongst 
the honorary Arts, the Art of Agriculture, or Laws of Vege- 
tation should be taught and on Account of their knowledge 
and Skill in that as well as in other Arts, they should receive 
Honorary Degrees, and have a sufficient tract of Land appro- 
priated to the use of the Colledge, and the pupils kept to 
work on the Land a certain number of Hours every day, which 
would instruct them in the Theory of Agriculture, and enure 
them to Labour at the same time and if it once toucht their 
ambition would soon Eradicate from their Minds, the Preju- 
dice the Indians who generally have imbibed, that it is dis- 
respectable for their Men to Work, which at present is an 
impediment to their Industry. And Occasions there leading 
in the Intervals of their Hunting, Lazy, Indolent and Un- 
healthy Lives, and if this plan should Flatter the Ambition of 
the Indians, so as to meet with their Approbation, I think it 
promises the best Effects : for what cannot be done by Force 
of Infant Education when you have a fair Chance for it, by 
obtaining the Free Consent both of the Parent and Child, or 
what reformation is to be despaired of, when Clothed, Lodged 
and Fed, alike according to the English Fashion, but in the 
Cheapest manner, which may likewise have a haijpy Effect on 
the Nations from whence they respectively come. Several 



17 

things Encourage me to believe that such an Attempt, would 
be attended with Success over and above the Great Force, 
there is in Infant Education Amongst all Mankind." ^ 

However, "the opportunity of these pioneers to educate- 
their children was extremely small. If the mother could 
read, while the father was in the corn field, or with rifle upon 
the range, she would barricade the door to keep off the 
Indians, gather her little ones around her and by the light 
that came in from the crevices in the roof and sides of the 
cabin, she would teach them the rudiments of spelling from 
the fragments of some old book. After schools were taught, 
the price of a rough and antiquated copy of Dilworth's spell- 
ing-book was one dollar, and that dollar equal in value to fiva 
now. ' ' 

''The first school ever taught for the American settlers,. 
was by Samuel Seely in 1783. Francis Clark, an intemper- 
ate man came next. This was near Belief ontaine, in 1785. 
After this an inoffensive Irishman by the name of Halfpenny,, 
was employed by the people for several quarters. Spelling, 
reading, writing and the elements of arithmetic, were all the 
branches attempted to be taught, and these in a very imper- 
fect manner." 

"Following him the late pious and eccentric John 
Cl^rk, a preacher of the gospel, taught the youth of these 
settlements gratuitously. He was a good scholar, of Scotch 
descent and education, and initiated the young men of that 
day, not only in the rudiments of an English education, but 
in several instances in mathematics, natural philosophy and 
the Latin language."" 

Governor Reynolds said that "in the county of Randolph 
there was not a single school, or school-house in 1800, except 
John Doyle, a soldier of the Revolution under General Clark,, 
might have taught a few children in Kaskaskia at or after 
this period." 

' ' In the settlement of New Design, an Irishman, not well 
qualified, called Halfpenny, at this period instructed some 
pupils. This school was the only one amongst the Americans 
at this early day. In the American Bottom, perhaps a school 

'111. Hist. Coll. V. 2, The New Regime, 1765-1767, p. 272. 
2 Peck, J. M., Annals of the West, p. 707. 



18 

inight have existed, but not long at a time. Under the guid- 
ance of the Clergy in the French villages at rare intervals, 
schools were established, but their numbers and efficacy were 
limited. ' " 

The scarcity of schools, the opportunity for instruction, 
the dearth of books, and the ambition of some youths, who 
later were the pioneer leaders, were depicted by Governor 
Reynolds in these words: ''Before any common school was 
established in the settlement, where my father resided, I 
mounted a horse nearly every evening during the winter, and 
rode about a mile and a half to the residence of James 
Hughes, to study under his guidance the arithmetic. Mr. 
Hughes, although he was raised in the backwoods, and was 
filled with fun and frolic, was a man of strong mind, and a 
benevolent heart. He took great pleasure in teaching me 
arithmetic, and during this winter I studied the most im- 
portant principles contained in the treatise." 

''We had not the least idea when a school w^ould be 
established in the neighborhood; and I was advancing in 
years ; so that it was a matter of necessity to study with Mr. 
Hughes," 

"This was the first step I took towards an education, 
since we immigrated to Illinois. I attended to my ordinary 
business on the farm during the day, and in the evenings 
after the stock was fed I studied arithmetic with Mr. Hughes. 
In a few years after, schools were established in most of the 
colonies." 

"In the New Design Robert Lemen, an aged and respect- 
able pioneer of Illinois, taught a school. Others were opened 
in Goshen Settlement, and other colonies." 

"About the year 1805, a small school was formed in the 
settlement, where my father resided. I was a scholar at 
this humble institution during part of the winters, and the 
wet days, we could not work on the farm, for one or two years 
while we remained in the settlement. At times the school 
was not kept up for want of teachers. The scarcity of school 
books was also a great inconvenience to the scholar." 

"As soon as I commenced the study of arithmetic with 
Mr. Hughes, I commenced also an ambition and a small en- 



* Reynolds, My Own Times, p. 37. 



19 

tliusiasm for education generally. This disposition induced 
me to study and read almost every book I could obtain. It 
must be recollected at that day in Illinois, not a man in the 
country, professional or otherwise, had any collection of 
books that could acquire the name of a library. There were 
some books scattered through the country but they were not 
plentiful. Although my father was a reading man, and pos- 
sessed of a strong mind, yet as far as I recollect, he brought 
with him to the country no books, except the Bible. Many of 
the immigrants acted in the same manner as to books. ' ' 

''One exception I remember was: That John Fulton, 
who settled in the vicinity of my father, brought with him 
Rollin's Ancient History. " My father loaned it, and I read it 
day and night at the times 1 spared from labor. This was 
the first history I had ever seen, and it gave me a new field 
of mental existence. ' ' 

' * I made arrangement with my father to go all one winter 
to school. I had raised a colt he gave me, and I gave it to a 
man to work in my place on the farm, while I attended 
school. ' ' 

''At this school I studied reading, writing and arith- 
metic. I revised my studies of arithmetic I had commenced 
with Mr. Hughes. It was my energy and ambition more, 
I presume, than my capacity : But I learned rapidly — so my 
teachers always reported. ' ' 

"At that day, neither grammar, geography, nor books of 
science ever appeared in schools. And no branch of mathe- 
matics was taught except arithmetic. The custom of the day 
was also to study the lesson aloud. Each one in the school 
read out at the top of his voice if it suited the convenience of 
the scholar. This unenviable habit is changed at this day." 

' ' My father purchased a few books, and among them was 
a treatise on geography. This was a good work in four vol- 
umes, and presented a tolerably good geography of the in- 
habited giolDe. In this work was also contained a sketch of 
astronomy, and particularly, the solar system. This study 
surprised and astounded me. It was incomprehensible to me 
how it was possible, that the knowledge of the heavenly bodies 
could be obtained. I reflected on this science with all my 
humble abilities, and became well instructed on it, so far as 



20 

that short sketch afforded me the means. My father under- 
stood the general principles of astronomy tolerably well, 
and instructed me considerably in addition to the treatise 
mentioned above."* 

About the time Illinois was admitted as a state in the 
Union, educational conditions and opportunities were scarce- 
ly better than those which Reynolds described. An article 
in the Illinois Intelligencer, September 5, 1816, says that "at 
least one-third of the schools were really a public nuisance, 
and did the people more harm than good ; another third about 
balanced the account, by doing about as much harm as good, 
and perhaps one-third were advantageous to the community 
in various degrees. 

An example of the schools in Kaskaskia appears in the 
same paper, January 1, 1818, entitled "To the Patrons of 
Literature." J. Cheek "Informs the friends and guardians 
of erudition that he has opened a school in the town of Kas- 
kaskia, for the instruction of youth, in the different depart- 
ments of English Literature. He will extend the sphere of 
instruction so as to include the following sciences, viz : Read- 
ing, Writing, Orthography, Arithmetic, English Grammar, 
Geography, History, Rhetorick, Composition, Elocution, etc. 
He flatters himself that from his attention to the morals and 
scientifick avocations ^of his pupils, he will share no incon- 
siderable portion of the patronage of the judicious and dis- 
cerning people." 

"Mr. Cross respectfully informs his fellow citizens of 
Kaskaskia, and its vicinage, that he intends, should sufficient 
patronage be afforded, to open a School in this town, for the 
instruction of youth, in Orthography, Orthoepy, Reading, 
Writing, English Grammar, Arithmetic and Elocution. 

"Scholars who have graduated in these branches of 
tuition, will be instructed in the rudiments of History, Geogra- 
phy, Natural Philosophy and Mathematics." 

"Mr. C. will endeavor to instill in the minds of his 
scholars the vital importance of sound moral principle, and 
correct manners, which he will elucidate, by a regular course 
of lectures every Saturday. As soon as he can produce the 
necessary appendages, his school will be Lancasterian. No 

* Reynolds, My Own Times, p. 92. 



21 

advance payment will be required, but a punctual compliance 
with the terms of subscription, at the expiration of each 
quarter is confidently calculated upon."^ 

Rev. Timothy Flint, a contemporary missionary in 
Missouri and Illinois, perhaps justly characterizes such 
teachers and schools in the following manner : "I have been 
amused in reading puffing advertisements in the newspapers. 
A little subscription school, in which half of the pupils are 
abecedarians, is a college. One is a Lancasterian school, or 
a school of instruction mutuelle. There is the Pestalozzi 
establishment, with its appropriate emblazoning. There is 
the Agricultural school, the Missionary school, the Grammar 
school, the new way to make a wit of a dunce in six lessons, 
and all the mechanical ways of inoculating children with 
learning, that they may not endure the pain of getting it in 
the old and natural way. I would not have you smile exclu- 
sively at the people of the West. This ridiculous species of 
swindling is making as much progress in your country as 
here. The misfortune is, that these vile pretentions finally 
induce people to believe that there is a royal road to learn- 
ing. The old beaten track, marked out by the only sure guide, 
experience, is forsaken. The parents are flattered, deceived, 
and swindled. Puffing pretenders take the place of the 
modest men of science, who scorn to compete with him in 
these vile arts. The children have their brains distended 
with the ''east wind," and grow up at once empty and con- 
tented. ' ' 

"These founders of new schools, for the most part, ad- 
vertise themselves from London, Paris, Philadelphia, New 
York, Boston, and all have performed exploits, in the regions 
whence they came, and bring the latest improvements with 
them. And to what they can do, and what they will do, the 
object is to lay on the colouring thick and threefold. A re- 
spectable man wishes to establish himself in a school in these 
regions. He consults a friend, who knows the meridian of 
the country. The advice is. Call your school by some new 
and imposing name. Let it be understood, that you have 
a new way of instructing children, by which they can learn 
twice as much, in half the time, as by the old ways. Throw 

"Illinois Intelligencer, January 6. 1819. 



22 

off all modesty. Move the water, and get in while it is mov- 
ing. In short, depend upon the gullibility of the people. A 
school, modeled on this advice, was instituted in St, Louis, 
while I was there, with a very imposing name. The masters 
— professors, I should say — propose to teach most of the 
languages, and all the sciences. Hebrew, they would com- 
municate in twelve lessons : Latin and Greek, with a propor- 
tionate promptness. These men, who were to teach all this, 
themselves, had read Erasmus with a translation, and knew 
the Greek alphabet, and in their public discourses, for they 
were ministers, sometimes dealt very abusively with the 
'king's English.' "* 

More definite undertakings than those described above 
for secondary education in this early period, were Belleville 
Academy and the preparatory department of Viucennes 
University. 

Governor Eeynolds says: ''In the school near my 
father's the teacher was unable to instruct any of his 
students in the higher branches of mathematics, or the 
sciences, and I made arrangements with the consent of my 
father, that I should attend, during the winter of 1806 and 
1807, a good school, taught by a competent teacher. This 
school was situated a few miles east of the present city of 
Belleville on the land of the present Mr. Schreader. I have 
often examined, with deep feeling, the tumult of earth where 
this school once stood. I revere and respect the site with 
the same feeling as the Jews in ancient times did the city of 
Jerusalem." 

"At this seminary, I studied land surve5ang and naviga- 
tion. I attended also, reading, spelling and writing. I be- 
came well conversant in the general principles of mathe- 
matics, and particularly in the science of land surveying. 
My compass and mathematical books, I retain to this day. I 
studied various branches of mathematics, and the sciences, 
until I calculated an almanac, but it was never printed. At 
that day, I never saw a printing office. At this school where 
I learned surveying, I studied also bookkeeping, of which I 
thought very little — my writing in this study improved my 
penmanship, but I think not very much my knowledge. ' '" 

• Flint, Recollections of the Last Ten Tears, p. 185. 

* Reynolds, My Own Times, p. 94. 



23 

The earliest chartered academy serving the territory of 
Illinois was the preparatory department of Vincennes Uni- 
versity. March 26, 1804, four 3^ears after the organization 
of the Indiana territory, of which Illinois was a part until 
1809, the federal government reserved one entire township 
"to be located by the Secretary of the Treasury for the use 
of a Seminary of Learning. ' ' ' Secretary Gallatin selected 
a township in Gibson County, the chief city of which was 
Vincennes. Thereupon, the first territorial assembly, Novem- 
ber 29, 1806, passed "An Act to incorporate a University 
in Indiana territory." This enactment bears the signatures 
of Jesse B. Thomas, Speaker of the House of Eepresenta- 
tives, and P. Menard, President, pro-tem, of the Legislative 
Council, both Illinois men whose names were written large in 
the government of the state. 

The philosophy underlying the conception of this act 
is well stated in the preamble: 

"Whereas, the independence, happiness and energy of 
every republic depends (under the influence of the destinies 
of Heaven) upon the wisdom, virtue, talents and energy of 
its citizens and rulers, 

"And, whereas, science, literature and the liberal arts 
contribute m an eminent degree to improve those qualities 
and acquirements, 

"And, whereas, learning hath ever been found the ablest 
advocate of genuine liberty, the best supporter of rational 
religion and the source of the only solid and imperishable 
glory which nations can acquire." 

"And, fore as much as Literature and Philosopliy furnish 
the most useful and pleasing occupations, improving and 
varying the enjoyments of prosperity, affording relief under 
the pressure of misfortunes, and hope and consolation in the 
hours of death," 

"And considering that in a Commonwealth where the 
humblest citizens may be elected to the highest office, and 
where the Heaven-born prerogative of the right to elect, 
and to reject, is retained and secured to the citizens, the 
knowledge which is requisite for a magistrate and elector 
should be widely diffused : Be it therefore enacted, etc.* 

'Hist. Sketch of Ind. Vni., 1820-1904, p. 1. 
« State Supt. Report, 1885. p. 105. 



24 

The board of trustees was organized December 6, 1806, 
with William Henry Harrison, President; funds were raised 
by gifts, lotteries and the sale of part of the congressional 
grant; a brick building was erected and a preparatory de- 
partment started. However, it is doubtful whether this 
academy amounted to much, !)ecause Indiana, itself, failed to 
recognize the school when statehood was obtained in 1816. 
Besides the Illinois territorial legislature said nothing about 
education during the nine years of its existence, 1809-1818. 

The educational practices of this period were concerned 
mostly with ' ' class ' ' schools. The aristocratic tendencies of the 
Revolutionary days had not yet disappeared. Though some 
primary education was given, the dominant idea was still that 
of the old Latin grammar school and its successor, the 
academy. Private instruction usually had the * ' dead ' ' lan- 
guages and other secondary subjects in the curriculum. The 
equipment, however, in books and apparatus, was severely 
lacking, though schoolmasters tried to be abreast of the 
times, at least in the names given to their schools. The 
teachers, who were usually the proprietors, were in too many 
instances romantic free-lances with the soldier-of-fortune 
attitude. Their language, as that of the day, was bombastic 
and oratorical in style. However, the intellectual leaders 
of the day realized the swindling game of the quack instruct- 
ors, and made definite attempts to establish a system of edu- 
cation among the mass of the people as the bulwark of liberty 
in a republican government. 

"The dire poverty of the settlers, the hardships of fron- 
tier life, the long Indian wars, the pittance which the lands 
yielded even when used for school purposes, were all so many 
hindrances," to the establishment of a system of education.® 

''But in spite of the prejudices and illiteracy of many 
of our early citizens, they were by no means an unthinking 
people; their minds were stimulated by the necessity of in- 
vention imposed upon them by their peculiar circumstances; 
by political discussions in which they were interested from 
one election to another ; by moral questions that were debated 
among them; and, above all, by the religious discourses to 
which they often listened, and the controversies between the 



•McMaster, Hist, of the People of the U. S., v. 5, p. 370. 



25 

adherents of different sects, in whicli almost everybody 
sympathized with one party or another."" 

In the words of the eminent governor, Mr. Coles, ''there 
is no subject claiming the attention of the legislature of more 
vital importance to the welfare of the state and its future 
greatness and respectability, than the provision which should 
be made for the education of the rising and succeeding gene- 
rations. Intelligence and virtue are the main pillars in the 
temple of liberty. A government founded on the sovereignty 
of the people, and resting on, and controlled by them cannot 
be respectable, or even long endure, unless they are enlight- 
ened. To preserve and hand down to a continuous line of 
generations, that liberty which was obtained by the valor and 
virtue of our forefathers, we must make provision for the 
moral and intellectual improvement of those who are to fol- 
low us, and who are to inherit and have the disposal of the 
inestimable boon of self government."'^ 

In conclusion, one must say that the education of the 
early period was wholly individualistic with little realization 
of the theoretical plans. A British traveller, in 1765, peti- 
tioned the King for the right to establish a school in the 
valley of the Mississippi in order to teach the English, French 
and Indians, the useful arts of knowledge. The little instruc- 
tion that was given was usually through the efforts of some- 
one in the community who had had educational advantages 
in the older states. Frequently, a missionary preacher open- 
ed up a Latin grammar school in his own house, or an 
academy was established where a knowledge of the languages, 
philosophy and some practical subjects was kept alive. 
Itinerant teachers appeared in the villages and purported to 
bring from the Eastern and European centers of culture the 
newest and most approved methods of teaching. In reality, 
they were without character, knowledge, or means of sup- 
port. To keep the ideal of democracy alive, and to perpetuate 
free institutions, the territorial legislature established an 
academy at Vincennes, 1806, which they hoped to have sup- 
ported from the proceeds of the liberal land grants made by 
the national government. The career of this institution 



"Patterson, Early Society in So. 111.. Ferg. Hist. Ser., v. 14, p. 124. 
" Coles Message to the Legislature, Sen. Jr., 1824, p. 19. 



26 

ended in failure because it was planted in a wilderness where 
protection from Indians, clearing the land, and earning a 
living, were the prime considerations of the emigrants. But 
Illinois legislatures continued to encourage education by en- 
acting legislation favorable to the academy, which is the 
subject of the next chapter. 



27 



CHAPTER III. 



Administrative Organization and Support. 

The academy arose as an institution partly to meet the 
demands of a constantly growing republican society. While 
it was a school under the control of either public or private 
incorporation of trustees, it was recognized throughout the 
country in theory, as a semi-public institution. Most of the 
eastern, southern and middle states recognized its public 
function by assisting in its foundation and support. Public 
lands, as in Georgia, by the act of 1783, was one of the bases 
of endowment, while New York, in 1813, established a literary 
fund the income from which was distributed to the academies. 

Illinois, likewise, recognized the public function of the 
academies by giving legislative sanction to groups of indi- 
viduals to establish such schools. The poor should always 
be taken care of; boys and girls of all classes should be 
educated free when the funds of the local institutions per- 
mitted ; religious freedom was insisted upon ; occasionally, the 
trustees were elected by the public at large, and the legisla- 
ture regarded its own action, public. Moreover, the state 
allowed and sanctioned, in some instances, the use of the 
income from the school lands for the support of academies; 
distributed to the academies their share of the common school 
fund, and allowed communities to tax themselves for the 
support of such institutions. 

In fact, the academy was permitted to do almost any- 
thing. The legislature assumed no continuous policy in the 
charters that it granted. The powers, duties and organization 
were left to the will of the incorporators generally. The 
laissez faire policy of the government followed the conscious 
democratic ideal of individual liberty after chartering the 
institution. The administrators had particular purposes in 
view which they wanted executed. Girls who had had little 



28 

opportunity in the colonial Latin grammar schools of the 
East were here admitted on almost equal terms. Boys were 
educated in separate institutions or with the girls in the same 
institution. Intellectual, moral or physical aims were empha- 
sized as the educational ideal according to the bias of the 
organizers. The whole country, however, was agreed that 
the academy should supply teachers for the common schools, 
so that it was in reality the forerunner of the normal schools. 
A closer examination of the administrative organization, pur- 
poses, and the financial support of the academy, follows: 

From 1818 to 1848, the legislature of Illinois granted 
charters to 125 educational corporations by special act, rather 
than by general law. Although a corporation law was en- 
acted in 1848, the general assembly continued to charter 
schools by special legislation until the adoption of the con- 
stitution of 1870, which forbade specific laws for corporations 
of learning except those under the control of the state.^ 

The first general assembly chartered Belleville, Madison 
and Washington Academies, the first and last of which were 
soon in operation. The semi-public character of the char- 
tered and some of the private academies was shown in these 
ways: 

1. A group of the community undertook to educate its 
youth: ''Whereas several inhabitants of the town of Ed- 
wardsville and county of Madison, have entered into arrange- 
ments, to build, by subscription amongst themselves, an 
academy for the education of youth ; and whereas so laudable 
and useful an undertaking is deserving of legislative sanc- 
tion, therefore, be it enacted * * *"- 

2. The trustees of Belleville, Madison and Washington 
Academies were trustees of the towns in which the academies 
were located. In fact, suffrage was defined in these charters, 
and those who voted for town trustees elected academic trus- 
tees.- 

3. Many of the charters carried provision for the free 
education of the poor, and a few, for the free education of 
the Indian: "And, whereas, the establishment of an institu- 
tion of this kind in the neighborhood of the aboriginees of 

^ Harker, III. Ed. Cor. under Special Charter. 
* Session Laws, I. Sess., p. 48. 



29 

the country may tend to the gradual civilization of the rising 
generation, and, if properly conducted, be of essential service 
to themselves, and contribute greatly to the cause of human- 
ity and brotherly love, which all men ought to bear to each 
other, of whatever colour, and tend also to preserve that 
friendship and harmony which ought to exist between the 
government and the Indians. Be it, therefore, enacted, and 
it is hereby enjoined on the said Trustees to use their utmost 
endeavors to induce the said aboriginees to send their chil- 
dren to the university for education, who, when sent, shall 
be maintained, clothed and educated at the expense of the 
said institution."- Also, ''The trustees shall be enjoined to 
cause the children of the poor people, in the said county, to 
be instructed gratis."- Even, it was contemplated, when the 
funds of the institution should permit that all the youth were 
to be instructed free, "in all or any of the branches of educa- 
tion which they may require. "" 

4. In other than academies for female education, it was 
provided that girls as well as boys were to be educated, when 
sufficient money was at hand : ' ' That it shall be the duty of 
the trustees, as soon as the funds of the academy will admit 
of it, to establish an institution for the education of females ; 
and to make such by-laws and ordinances for the government 
thereof, as they shall deem proper and necessary,"^ 

5. In practically every charter thai was granted, religi- 
ous freedom was recognized as a public duty. "No prefer- 
ence shall be given, nor any discrimination be made in the 
choice of trustees, professors, teachers or students, on account 
of religious sentiments ; nor shall the trustees, professors, or 
teachers, at any time make by-laws, or ordinances, or regu- 
lations, that may in any wise interfere with, or in any man- 
ner, control the right of conscience or the free exercise of 
religious worship."* 

6. Public election of the trustees in several of the char- 
tered academies was required; "And, be it further enacted, 
that all free white male inhabitants of the age of twenty-one 
years who have resided for six months immediately preced- 

2 Session Laws, I. Sess., p. 48. 
2 State Supt. Report. 1885, p. 105. 

• In 1841, the legislature repealed the clause of the law which had forbidden 
the establishment of theological departments in Academies and Colleges. 



30 

ing the election within the following limit shall be, and 

hereby authorized to elect seven trustees on the forenoon of 
the day appointed for the election of members to the next 
general assembly of this state, and on such election day for- 
ever thereafter."* 

7. The legislature, itself, specifically stated that it re- 
garded such charters as public acts: ''Be it, further enacted, 
that -this act shall be deemed to be a public act, and as such 
shall be construed benignly and favorably, in all courts and 
places for every beneficial purpose therein mentioned."* 

Ordinarily, the preambles of the charters, or the charters 
themselves, or constitutions of school societies, explained the 
purpose for ^vhich the orgaiiizations were made. 

1. The most usual statement of the purpose of these 
associations was that, "the dissemination of useful knowl- 
edge should be the only object contemplated."* 

2. The preamble of the Jacksonville Academy stated 
that the high, intellectual and moral culture of women was 
its object: "Whereas, the vast importance and urgent neces- 
sity of extending the blessings of Education to all classes of 
American Citizens are felt and acknowledged by all enlight- 
ened patriots and Christians; and, whereas, the power of 
female influence over the intellectual and moral character of 
the community must ever be too great for any or all other 
causes entirely to counteract. Commencing as it does with 
the first dawn of infant intelligence and forming perhaps 
the most important and certainly, the most desirable part of 
that character, before any other cause can begin to act upon 
it, and accompanying it through all the subsequent stages 
of its development; considering, too, that in the present im- 
portant crisis of our beloved Republic, no one effort ought to 
be withheld which can tend to give permanency to its founda- 
tions, the intelligence and virtue of the people; therefore, 
Eesolved, that an academy ought to be immediately estab- 
lished in this state, to be devoted exclusively to female edu- 
cation; and that Jacksonville, in Morgan county, is, in our 
opinion, a situation highly favorable for the successful oper- 
ation of such an institution."^ 



♦Session Laws, T. Sess., p. 48. 

•Session Laws, 1834-5, State Rep. 1867, p. 264. 



31 

3. The Bloomington Female Seminary, intended to pro- 
mote the general interests of education, "and to qualify 
young females for the honorable and useful discharge of the 
various duties of life."* 

4. Some of the academies had a normal school depart- 
ment for the education of teachers. ''A department is at- 
tached to this school for the instruction of teachers."' 

5. The Hillsboro Academy was an example of an institu- 
tion that existed for the education of both boys and girls: 
*'The design of the institution is to accommodate those of 
either sex who may wish to pursue a systematic and thorough 
course m Education, in the various English branches or in 
the languages."^ 

6. The Rushville High School Association declared: 
''The sole object of this corporation shall be for the promo- 
tion of^ science and literature, and the general interest of 
Education, and its corporate powers shall be similar to those 
conferred upon other corporate bodies for the advancement 
of education."^ 

7. A distinctly moral purpose was given as the reason 
for establishing some academies. Monticello Seminary w-as 
founded on the principle that education should have refer- 
ence to man's relation to God, Christ, and the future world, 
in accordance with the Christian religion.^ 

8. The physical education of the students was one pur- 
pope for which some schools Were established, but there is no 
evidence that physical education as we now understand the 
meaning of that term was given. 

9. The trustees of the Monroe Academy were library 
trustees, whose additional duty was to circulate books among 
the people of the community: "That there shall be estab- 
lished m the said county, a public library, to be called the 
Monroe Circulating Library, and that the trustees of the said 
academy shall be the directors of the said library society, 
who shall have power to make such rules and regulations for 
the government of the same, as they shall deem proper."^" 

« Session Laws, 1835-6. 
' Sangamo Jr., Oct. 21, 1837. 
'Sangamo Jr.. Oct. 21. 1837. 
•Session Laws, 1844-5, p. 311. 
»» Session Laws, 1827. 



32 

10. Several academies were established as manual labor 
schools, of which more will be said later. 

11. Finally, some school associations were formed for 
the education of all of the children of the locality— " all, " 
meaning the children of the common people.'^ 

One of the most interesting and unusual ways of electing 
the seven trustees for each of the first three academies is 
defined in the following manner: "Be it farther enacted by 
the authority aforesaid, That the several persons herein be- 
fore named, to wit: Benjamin Stephenson, Joseph Bowers, 
Eobert Latham, John Todd, Joseph Conway, Abraham 
Prickett, and Theopholis W. Smith, be and they are hereby 
appointed trustees in the town of Edwardsville in the afore- 
said county of Madison to continue in office until the election 
of their successors as herein after provided." The time for 
the election is stated in the act, notification of which was 
posted in public places, the election district is defined, and 
the qualifications for suffrage are given.^' 

Danville Academy, a public joint stock company, ap- 
pointed twenty-seven commissioners from the five surround- 
ing counties to solicit and receive stock. When $1,500 had 
been collected, the commissioners were to call an election in 
three weeks, notice of which was to be posted in six of the 
most public places in the county, of the time of holding the 
election for trustees. The election was held at the court 
house in Danville between the hours of twelve and six p. m. 
of the day determined upon. Moreover, the commissioners 
were appointed to act as judges of the election. Subsequent 
elections were to be held annually, the first Monday in Oc- 
tober. Those who had the privilege of voting for trustees 
were stockholders who had paid on, or before the said elec- 
tion day, five dollars on each share subscribed and the re- 
mainder, within six months. ^^ 

The church was represented on the board of trustees of 
many academies : ' ' The trustees of this institution shall con- 
sist of nine, who shall be elected as follows : one-third of the 
whole number by the Presbyterian Church N. S. of Rushville, 
one-third by the stockholders, and the remaining by the 

" Sangamo Jr., June 5. 1845 

12 Session Laws, I. Sess., 1819, p. 48. 

w Session Laws, 1836-37. 



33 

patrons of the school for the time being, and they shall hold 
their office for the time of three years."" 

Moreover, this method for the perpetual succession of 
policy was provided: the trustees were to hold ''their office 
for the term of three years, except from the first election, 
when one-third of the number shall be elected for three years, 
one-third for the term of two years, and the remaining for 
the term of one year, and any year thereafter, one-third of 
the whole number shall be elected for the term of three years, 
at such a time and in such a manner as may be prescribed by 
the by-laws of the institution."" 

Town trustees, ministers of religion, county school com- 
missioners and stockholders were members of the board of 
trustees; the term of office, manner of election, and number 
varied to suit the ideas of the incorporators rather than fol- 
lowing, or having a fixed policy of administrative organi- 
zation. 

The powers and duties of the trustees of the academies 
covered a wide range. They called special meetings to trans- 
act the business of the academy; made contracts for the re- 
pairing and erection of buildings; passed by-laws and ordi- 
nances for the conduct and government of the school; filled 
vacancies in their own body; elected a principal and teach- 
ers; determined salaries; removed officers for misconduct: 
appointed committees of their own number; received money 
subscribed for the institution, and appointed their own treas- 
urer, secretary, stewards, managers and other necessary 
officers. 

"The chairman of the board shall have power to call 
special meetings, giving five days previous notice thereof, a 
majority at any stated, adjourned or special meeting, shall 
form a board of quorum, and a majority of them shall be 
capable of doing and transacting all the business and con- 
cerns of the said academy, and particularly of entering into 
contracts for erecting and repairing any building or build- 
ings necessary for the said institutions, of making and enact- 
ing by-laws and ordinances for the government of the said 
academy and not contrary to the constitution and laws of the 
United States, or of this state; of filling vacancies in the 

"Session Laws, 1814-5, p. 311. 



34 

board of trustees occasioned by death, resignation or removal 
out of the state; of electing and appointing the principal 
professors and teachers of said academy; of agreeing with 
them for their salaries, and of removing them for misconduct, 
or breach of the laws of the institution; of appointing com- 
mittees of their own body to carry into execution all and 
every resolution of the board; of appointing a chairman, 
treasurer and secretary, out of their own number; and stew- 
ards, managers, and other customary officers for the taking 
care of the estate, and management of the concerns of the 
institution." 

The trustees of the chartered academies, after 1830, were 
specifically made bodies politic and corporate, "with power 
to sue and be sued, plead and be impleaded, to acquire, hold 
and convey property, real and personal, to have and to use a 
common seal, to alter the same at pleasure, to make laws for 
its regulation provided they are not inconsistent with the 
laws of the United States and this state. ' '^^ 

Some restrictions of power placed upon trustees were 
that they should ''hold the property of the said institution 
for the purpose of female education, and not as a stock for 
individual benefit of themselves, or of any contribution to the 
endoMTnent of the same; and no particular religious faith 
shall be required of those who become trustees or students 
of the institution.'"** 

Sometimes the trustees regulated and prescribed the 
course of study; fixed the rate of tuition; purchased books 
and regulated the conduct of pupils: "The trustees of said 
high school association shall have authority from time to 
time to prescribe and regulate the course of studies to be 
pursued in said high school, and in the preparatory depart- 
ment thereof; to fix the rate of tuition, to make rules for the 
general management of the affairs of the said high school, 
and for the regulation of the conduct of the students, and to 
add, as the ability of the said corporation shall increase, and 
the interest of the community shall require, additional de- 
partments, for the study of all or any of the solid, useful and 



^^ Session Laws, I. Sess., p. 4S^. 
"Session Laws, 1834-1835, Sec. 1. 



35 

profitable branches of classical, mathematical and philo- 
sophical literature. ' '^^ 

Financial Support. 

School lands, very early, were the basis of any state sup- 
port that was given to the academies. An act approved Jan- 
uary 27, 1821, by the state, gave the trustees of Belleville 
Academy the "power and authority to lease out, upon such 
terms and conditions as to them shall seem meet, for any 
time not exceeding ten years, section number sixteen, in town- 
ship number one, north of range number eight, west of the 
third meridian, reserved for the use of schools, for the benefit 
of the inhabitants of said township." 

''Be it further enacted. That the trustees of Belleville 
Academy shall and may appropriate one-half of the net pro- 
ceeds of the annual profits accruing from the rents of said 
sixteenth section, to the use and benefit of said academy, and 
shall reserve the other half of said rents and profit, to and 
for the use of schools in the north half of said township, to 
be paid over and applied in such manner as shall be pointed 
out by law." 

"Be it further enacted. That there shall be a meeting of 
the male inhabitants above the age of twenty-one years, re- 
siding in the north half of said township, at Belleville, on the 
first Monday in April next; which meeting shall take into 
consideration the propriety of permitting the trustees of 
Belleville Academy to apply the whole of the rents and profit 
to the said Academy, and should said meeting consent, the 
whole of the rents and profits of said section shall be applied 
to the use of said Academy for such term of time as said 
meeting shall agree to."^^ 

The state at other times authorized the use of some of 
the money of the township fund for the establishment of a 
school: "The inhabitants of township five south, range six 
east, of the third principal meridian, upon being incorpor- 
ated as required by law for school purposes, be and they are 
hereby authorized to use the sum of two hundred dollars of 
the interest accruing from said township fund, to the erec- 



" Session Laws, 1844-1845, Sec. 3, p. 311. 
"Session Laws, 1821, p. 34. 



36 

tion of a frame or brick schoolhouso in tlie town of McLeans- 
boro in said township.'"'' 

Another example of aid given by the state is that in 
which 'Hhe school commissioners of Jefferson County be au- 
thorized and required to receive the said schedule of the 
school taught in the Mount Vernon Academy in the year 1840, 
and duly certified by the trustees and teachers thereof, and 
apportioned thereon its distributive share of interest of the 
school fund due for 1842, according to the schedules filed for 
distribution in January, 1843; provided that all schedules in 
said county, regularly certified for that year, and notified to 
rhe said commissioner before he actually made the apportion- 
ment of interest of that year, shall be paid in like manner. ' ' ^^ 

Furthermore, the state authorized money to be paid to 
some academies: ''The school commissioner of Coles county 
is hereby authorized and required to pay to the order of the 
president and trustees of the Charleston Seminary two hun- 
dred dollars per year, out of the distributive share of the 
state fund, for the purpose of education, to the county of 
Coles; and the said trustees are hereby authorized to expend 
said money in such manner as they may think proper for the 
use and benefit of said seminary.'"^ 

It was the common practice for academies to receive 
their distributive share out of the township school fund for 
maintaining a common school. The act of 1835 distributed 
the interest from the state school fund to counties in propor- 
tion to the number of inhabitants under twenty-one years of 
age. "Nor shall this act be so construed so as to prevent said 
school from receiving its just proportion from the township 
and state fund, as other schools do; and said trustees shall 
perform the same duties in regard to said school, for the pur- 
pose of obtaining their proportion of said school fund, as is 
or may be required of trustees of schools in other town- 
ships. "" 

The law relative to the Winchester male and female pre- 
paratory and common school said that ''nothing in this act 
shall be so construed as to prevent either of the above 



"Session Laws, 1837, p. 16. 
2« Session Laws, 1842-3, p. 6. 
" Session Laws, 1839-40, p. 131. 
*^ Session Laws, 1839-40, p. 56. 



37 

named institutions from receiving their proper proportions 
of money appropriated by law for common school pur- 
poses."-^ 

Even organizations like mechanics' unions received their 
share of the state school fund for keeping a common school 
The Springfield Mechanics' Union, ''on the establishment of 
their common school, shall receive from the school commis- 
sioner oi the county the same amount of money, in the same 
proportion, and apply the same to such tuition, in the same 
manner as other common schools are kept and paid.'"* The 
school established by this act immediately was opened under 
the name of the Springfield City Schools. 

It was also the custom for private academies, unchar- 
tered, to receive state aid. An academy in Peoria, in 1840, 
says this about its funds: ''This is not a chartered institu- 
tion,_nor aided by any public funds, except that it shares the 
public school fund together with the common schools of the 
town. ' '-^ 

The state virtually aided academies by a general law of 
1842, which exempted from taxation ten acres of land owned 
by any literary institution; and for colleges and academies 
exempted a hundred sixty acres, if actually used as its loca- 
tion and domain, with all buildings, libraries, and appa- 
ratus.^^ 

The idea of taxing the people of the community for sup- 
porting an academy is found in some of the charters : ' ' The 
trustees of the town of Winchester may levy and collect a tax 
not exceeding one per centum on all taxable property in said 
town, to be applied to purposes of education, as said trustees 
shall from time to time direct: Provided, That before any tax 
can be levied as aforesaid, and on application of twelve citi- 
zens of the town, the trustees shall cause an election to be 
held, where each inhabitant residing within the incorporate 
limits of said town, may have the privilege of voting for or 
against a tax, and if a majority of two-thirds of the votes 
given at said election shall be in favor of a tax, then and in 
that cas e the trustees may levy a tax and in no other."" 

*' Session Laws, 1841, p. 290, Sec. 6 
='■» Session Laws, 1839-40, p. 74. Sec. 2 
"Peoria Directory, 1844, p. 115 
"State Supt. Report, 1883-4, p. 116 
"Session Laws, 1841, p. 290, Sec. 7. 



38 

The original proprietors of the town of Payson were far- 
sighted enough to make provision at a future time for the 
establishment of an academy by using twenty per cent of the 
proceeds from the sale of lots in that town for that purpose: 
''The original proprietors of the town of Payson, in their 
proposal for the sale of town lots, stipulated twenty per cent 
of the amount of sales of town lots should be appropriated 
toward the establishment of a Seminary of Learning from 
which fund, now accrued, amounts to $1,300.-^ 

Individuals, themselves, aided secondary education by 
endowments. Tlie founder and benefactor of Monticello Semi- 
nary set aside $10,000 for that purpose, as early as 1834. 
The building was begun in 1836 and opened for pupils in 
1838.^^ 

A few public-spirited men bequeathed money for the 
erection and establishment of academies. Silas Hamilton left 
$4,000 for the creation of the Hamilton Primary School to 
educate the children of his friends and neighbors.^" 

Tuition was one of the factors in the support of educa- 
tion. The Sangamo Journal, April 21, 1838, stated that 
''academies and colleges are founded by private enterprise, 
and supported by individual liberality and munificence. 
Those who seek these institutions must necessarily pay in 
proportion to the benefit received.'"^ 

Occasionally, academies were public joint-stock com- 
panies, so that the money necessary for the founding of 
schools was raised by the sale of stock, worth from ten to 
twenty-five dollars a share, allowing the share holders free 
tuition for every share held, and with the privilege of voting 
on the policies of the institution: "The said academy, when 
erected and in operation, shall at all times be open for use 
and the privilege of every white person, within the United 
States, who may wish to be instructed by the instructors or 
instructresses, employed by the trustees thereof; Provided, 
Said free white person will comply with the laws, and pay 
the sum affixed by the said trustees, for the instruction of 
students attending the same; Provided nevertheless, that 



=» Session Laws, 1841, Sec. 7. 
» State Supt. Report, 1867-8 ; p. 267. 
=0 Session Laws, 1839-40, Preamble. 
« Sangamo Jr., April 21, 1838. 



39 

each and every stockholder in said institution shall be en- 
titled to the admission of one pupil in the same for each and 
every share he or she may legally hold therein. On payment 
of ten dollars to the treasurer of the institution ever}^ free 
white person shall be considered a stockholder. ' ' ^^ 

The stock of the Rushville High School Association 
"shall consist of shares of twenty-five dollars each, to be 
subscribed for in the manner that the commissioners herein 
after named, or the trustees when elected shall direct, and 
shall be deemed personal property, and shall be transferable 
on the books of said corporation in such manner as the board 
of trustees may prescribe ; the capital stock shall not exceed 
ten thousand dollars, and its funds, rents and privileges shall 
be used only for the purposes of education herein declared. "^^ 

Every charter placed a limitation on the amount of prop- 
erty to be held. This varied from the one hundred thousand 
acres of land allowed to Vincennes University, to twelve acres 
of land allowed the Jacksonville Female Academy. But very 
few cases have been found where more than a thousand acres 
of land was allowed to chartered academies. The legislature 
that granted the Jacksonville charter had this to say relative 
to the property to be held by the academy: "The lands within 
the bounds of this State, held in perpetuity by this charter, 
shall not exceed twelve acres, held at any one time; and if 
donations in land shall be made at any time to said corpora- 
tion, the same may be received and held in trust by said board 
of trustees, and shall be sold within three years from the 
date of such donation for the benefit of said institution; in 
failure whereof, the land so given shall revert to the donor 
or grantor of the same and the said board of trustees shall in 
no case lease or rent out any land so held in trust as afore- 
said."'* 

The amount allowed to Rushville High School Associa- 
tion was a little larger: "The lands, tenements, and heredita- 
ments, to be held in perpetuity by virtue of this act by said 
corporation, shall not exceed three hundred and twenty 
acres." 



'^ Session Laws. 

''Session Laws, 1844-45, p. 311. 

»< Session Laws, 1834-5. 

*> Session Laws, 1844-45, p. 311. 



40 

The chartered academies were quasi-public institutions 
because, (a) a group in the community undertook to educate 
its youth; (b) the trustees were frequently elected by the 
public; (c) the poor children of the Indians were educated 
gratis; (d) all youth were to be educated free when the funds 
of the academy w^ere sufficient; (e) religious freedom was 
recognized as a public necessity; (f) the legislature regarded 
the charter a public act. 

The purposes for which academies were established were 
(a) to disseminate useful knowledge; (b) to give women high 
intellectual and moral culture; (c) to fit youth for the various 
duties of life; (d) to prepare teachers for the common 
schools; (e) to promote science and literature; (f) to safe- 
guard and develop the physical body; (g) to circulate books 
among the people; (h) to inaugurate a system of manual 
labor with literary education; (i) to educate the children of 
the ''people". 

The trustees, varying in number in the different acad- 
emies, were elected or appointed, with powers that were 
usually conferred on bodies corporate and politic, though no 
fixed rule was adoptd in that respect. The administrative 
organization was fixed to suit the will of the individual in- 
corporators, with few exceptions. 

Financially, academies were benefited by the sale or rent 
of school lands, when that was deemed advisable ; were occa- 
sionally aided in establishment by the funds of the township 
in which they were located; were usually given their share 
of the school fund for keeping a common school; were prom- 
ised a state subsidy; were to receive local taxes if the people 
of the community wished to vote them ; were endowed by gifts 
directly, or received money by wills ; were supported by tui- 
tion, and had a fund created by the sale of stock divided into 
a stipulated number of shares. Religious organizations used 
one or several of the means above suggested in the support 
they gave academic education. The next chapter, therefore, 
is a consideration of the religious influence on education. 



41 



CHAPTER IV. 



Religions Influence. 

In spite of the academic legislation provided by the 
state, little machinery existed for the administration, organ- 
ization, and supervision of education outside of the church. 
In colonial days, a close relation existed between the church 
and the school, and that intimacy continued to about the 
middle of the nineteenth century. It was but natural that 
the minister should direct and supervise instruction because 
he was well educated, entirely qualified, and had sufficient 
leisure time. The aim of education, the subject matter, and 
teacher certification, all, had a religious tone. 

The grammar school had grown up under the religious 
denominations in the colonies. But there came a time of re- 
ligious revival, about 1740, in England and her colonies, 
when the established mode of worship was questioned. New 
denominations could only perpetuate their religious beliefs 
by establishing schools. Likewise, there was a revival in 
education so that new institutions were necessary, in educa- 
tion as well as in religion, to meet the new ideals, one expres- 
sion of which was the academy. The connection of the 
church with the academy was somewhat different than its re- 
lation to the Latin grammar school. No longer was a religi- 
ous test required of the teachers, no longer was religion the 
primary subject of study, but the churches still kept a large 
part of the control and organization of the academy in their 
hands. There was no other body yet developed that could 
assume the responsibility. 

The Catholics, the Baptists, the Methodists, the Presby- 
terians, and the Congregationalists sent missionaries to Illi- 
nois who established schools as well as preached the gospel. 
One of the chief institutions established by the pioneer 



42 

preachers, with the exception of the Catholics/ was the acad- 
emy, because the missionaries came to Illinois at the time of 
the academy period. Home organizations sent representa- 
tives to the new West to establish branches, convert the 
Indian and the pioneer, and to educate the children of the 
forest and of the newcomers. How conscientious and faith- 
ful those talented missionaries were, is evidenced by the in- 
dividual schools that they established and maintained, fre- 
quently at their own expense. They paved the way for the 
later tides of emigration, the latter making it possible to 
maintain a local system of academic education. The frontier 
was not free from jealousies for the hospitable southerner 
hated the shrewdness of the Yankee. Religious disputes 
naturally arose between the former and the latter, traces of 
which are found in the struggle for and maintenance of the 
academies. Although the Yankee left his mark on those insti- 
tutions, he forsook them for the common school. A closer 
survey of the religious educational influence, therefore, is 
relevant. 

The French Jesuits exerted the earliest religious and 
educational influence in the territory that is now the state 
of Illinois. Eev. J. M. Peck had this to say of Kaskaskia 
under French rule : ' ' In olden time, Kaskaskia was to Illinois 
what Paris is at this day to France. Both were, at their 
respective days, the great emporiums of fashion, gayety, and 
I must say, happiness also. In the year 1721, the Jesuits 
erected a monastery and college in Kaskaskia, and a few 
years after it was chartered by the French government. "- 

Kaskaskia, in 1796, though mostly French in population, 
but under English control, had degenerated to such an extent 
that Austin Ville said the Jesuit college in that city was then 
in ruins, although the city and the college were very flourish* 
ing under the French government.^ 

However, the Catholics maintained, from time to time, in 
the French settlement of Kaskaskia, a convent for the edu- 
cation of young ladies. In 1828, this school is spoken of as 

> The Catholics had a college at Kaskaskia in the early part of the 18th 
century, but it fell into disuse at the end of the French period. In the early part 
of the 19th century a similar institution was revived in the same town, but that 
was not typical of Catholic activity in other parts of the state until about the close 
of our period. 

2 Powers. History of Springfield, p. 6, quotes Peck. 

» Doc. Am. Hist. Rev., April, 1900, p. 538. 



43 

being at the zenith of its influence for the people of the West, 
and was deservedly very popular. 

The leaven of the whole educational movement in the be- 
ginnings of Illinois was the work of the Protestant preachers 
and missionaries. According to Eev. J. M. Peck, a Baptist 
minister, his denomination had these missionary preachers in 
the state: Josiah Dodge, 1784; James Lemen, 1784; David 
Badgley and Joseph Chance, who organized the first church 
in 1796 ; John Clark, 1797, and W. Jones, 1806. By 1807, five 
Baptist churches had formed an association. 

Governor Reynolds mentioned these Methodist mission- 
ary ministers : Joseph Lillard, 1793 ; Hosea Riggs, 1796 ; Ben- 
jamin Young, 1804; T. Harrison, 1804; J. Oglesby, 1805; C. 
R. Matheny, 1806; Jesse Walker, 1806; Bishop McKendree, 
1807; Peter Cartwright, 1824. By 1815, four Methodist- 
Episcopal circuits had been established. 

As was stated in the discussion of early education in 
Illinois, James Lemen, a Baptist preacher, opened one of the 
first schools. Father John Clark was a conspicuous and 
efficient character in the pulpit and the schools. He taught 
many of the rising generation of that day the general prin- 
ciples of education.* 

Smith and Mills, in their missionary tour of the West, 
showed that preachers would be welcomed to keep schools. 
''Governor Edwards assured us, that a preacher of popular 
talents would receive a salary of $1,000 per annum, for 
preaching a part of the time, and instructing a small school. ' '^ 

The constitution of the Foreign Missionary Society of 
the Valley of the Mississippi gave one of its objects to be the 
promotion,^ *'by all suitable means, within the Valley of the 
Mississippi, the missionary spirit in theological seminaries, 
colleges, academies, and the community."® " 

The legislature of the state, in 1821, passed an act to 
encourage learning in White county, making the township 
trustees and church trustees coordinate bodies in conducting 
a school for the township: ''Whereas, there is a society of 
Christians, called Cumberland Presbyterians, who have 
erected a meeting house for public worship on the sixteenth 

••Reynolds, My Own Times, p. 194. 

»Rep. Miss. Tour, by Mills and Smith, p. 17. 

•First Annual Rep. Foreign Miss. Soc, p. 4. 



44 

section in township five south, of range eight east, of the third 
principal meridian, in this state, and whereas, the said house 
may serve to have the gospel preached therein, and likewise 
may be used for a schoolhouse for the township. Therefore, 
''Sec. I. Be it enacted by the People of the State of Illi- 
nois, represented in the General Assembly, that two or more 
of the county commissioneers of White county are hereby 
authorized and required to lease five acres of land of said 
section sixteen, in township five south, range eight east, in- 
cluding said meeting house and burial ground, to the trus- 
tees of the township for ninety-nine years, for the use of said 
society of Cumberland Presbyterians, and for the use of 
schools of said township." 

"Sec. 2. Be it further enacted, that the said school which 
may be taught in said house shall be under the direction of 
the trustees of the township and said society of Cumberland 
Presbyterians. There shall never be given any preference to 
one sect of people over another in said school, but at all 
times, the said society of Cumberland Presbyterians shall be 
entitled to hold divine service in said house during said 
lease.'" 

Perhaps one of the most influential men in the religious, 
social, and the educational life of the people of early Illinois, 
was John Mason Peck. He was born at South Farms, Conn,, 
in 1787, and received his education in the common schools 
and the academy of his town. He studied science, literature 
and medicine in Philadelphia. The year 1818 found him 
teaching school in St. Louis. Settling in Illinois soon after, 
he preached and taught school. January 1, 1827, he invited 
all those favorable to the establishment of a college or semi- 
nary to meet at his home, in Rock Spring, St. Clair county, 
which was situated on the principal stage route to Vincennes, 
seventeen miles east of St. Louis. 

Peck was engaged a j^ear in raising funds for the insti- 
tution to be established. He and his hired men cut the timber 
and built the school. Five hundred dollars and twenty-five 
acres of land were contributed by Peck himself. Nine trus- 
tees were appointed and one hundred shares of stock at ten 

'Session Laws. 1821, p. ISS. 



45 

dollars a share were to be sold to support the two depart- 
ments to be established.^ 

Rock Spring Theological and High School was the name 
given to this institution. ''The general plan of study is ac- 
commodated to the circumstances of the preachers of the 
gospel, and to the wants of the country. Ministers, who 
have families, and those who are somewhat advanced in life, 
may attend the Institution as may suit their convenience. It 
is established on liberal principles, though under the par- 
ticular control of the Baptist denomination."^ 

' ' The second department is to be a scientific and literary 
institution for the accommodation of any class of students of 
approved character, and it is to be conducted on the prin- 
ciples of a High School. A professor of mathematics and 
natural philosophy, who shall be the principal of the High 
School Department, and direct the studies in languages," is 
to be appointed. ^° 

Joshua Bradley, holding an A. B. degree. Brown college, 
was the first president, and John Russell was principal of the 
high school. This department was conducted upon the plan 
of an academy "with modern improvements in education; and 
admitting students without distinction of age or previous 
study. '"^ 

The first annual report said that there were about sixty 
scholars. ''An unusually large proportion of the scholars 
have attended to writing, arithmetic, grammar, and geog- 
raphy. Five young gentlemen have mastered the difficulties 
of algebra, one of whom is now studying geometry. Three 
students are pursuing the stud}^ of Latin. '"- 

Other denominations in this early period and, in fact, 
until after the Civil War, conducted religious-public schools 
of a similar nature. Three Methodist ministers, Wm. Beau- 
champ, Thomas Hinde, and Wm. McDowell, founded the town 
of Mt. Carmel in 1817 in order "to build a city on liberal and 
advantageous principles and to constitute funds for the estab- 
lishment of seminaries of learning and for religious pur- 

» Quart. Reg. Am. Ed. Soc, Nov., 1830, v. 4, p. 354. 

•Quart. Reg. Am. Ed. Soc, Nov., 1830, v. 4, p. 354 and 111 Int., Mch. 24, 1827. 

"111. Int., Mch. 24, 1827. 

" Peck, Guide for Immigrants, p. 248. 

" Illinois Intelligencer, May 16, 1829. 



46 

poses.'"* The articles of association for tlie city of Mt. 
Carmel provided for the division of the town site into a num- 
ber of lots, one-fonrth of which were called ''public donation 
lots * * * appropriated to the use of schools and religious 
purposes.'"* The money realized from the sale of the public 
donation lots constituted a fund from which one-third was to 
be used for a male academy, one-third for a female academy, 
and the remaining one-third for religious purposes. Accord- 
ingly, a school was opened by Beauchamp, in 1819, and a 
charter was granted by the legislature in 1825. Mt. Carmel 
was early a center of Methodist influence in the southern 
part of the state. Religious conferences were held in the 
town, out of which originated the movement which resulted 
in the founding of McKendreean College.* 

The New England influence was accentuated by the Con- 
gregational and Presbyterian preachers and missionaries 
from that district. "Mr. Wylie was the first Presbyterian 
clergyman, who settled permanently, in Illinois. This gentle- 
man was at the head of the seminary of learning in Randolph 
county, as well as attending to liis clerical duties. "^^ 

Rev. J. M. Ellis went to Illinois about 1820, and recog- 
nizing the need for schools, he began to advocate. a seminary. 
Money was raised and Ellis appealed to an eastern mission- 
ary society for help. This appeal fell into the hands of a 
member of the Yale class of 1828. Being interested in home 
missions, this graduate interested others of his class in the 
formation of the Illinois Association with the following 
pledge : 

''Believing in the entire alienation of the heart from 
God, in the necessity of the influence of the Holy Spirit for 
its renovation, and that these influences are not to be expected 
without the use of means; deeply impressed also with the 
destitute condition of the western section of our country, and 
the urgent claims of its inhabitants upon the benevolence 
of the East, and in view of the fearful crisis which is evi- 
dently approaching, and which we believe can only be averted 
jby speedy and energetic measures on the part of the friends 

"Boggess, Settlement of Illinois, p. 198, in Chi. Hist. Soc. Col., v. 5. 

w Ibid. 

* The early name of McKendree college. 

^''Heynolds, My Own Times, p. 199. 



47 

of religion and literature in tlie older state; and believing 
that evangelical religion and literature must go band in hand 
to the successful accomplishment of this desired end, we, 
the undersigned, express our readiness to go to the state of 
Illinois for the purpose of establishing a seminary of learn- 
ing such as shall be best adapted to the exigencies of that 
country, a part of us to engage in instruction in the seminary, 
the others, to occupy, as preachers, important stations in 
the surrounding country: provided the undertaking be de- 
cided practicable and the location approved: and provided 
also, the providence of God permits us to engage in it. 

Theron Baldwin, 
John F. Brooks, 
Mason Grosvenok, 
Elisha Jenney, 
William Kirby, 
J. M. Sturtevant, 
Asa Turner, 
Theological Department, Yale College, February 21, 1829.'"" 
One member of this group, Lemuel Foster, was sent as a 
missionary to Illinois. He drove overland with his bride 
and was ordained at Jacksonville, in 1832. He preached and 
his wife taught school in a log cabin. A little later, they 
had an academy with two school rooms on the first floor and 
a church above. 

The founder of Monticello Seminary had distinctly a 
religious conception in mind. This is his account: "One 
morning, while lying in bed, somewhat indisposed, my wife 
came into the room, and as she went out, made some remark. 
One of our little children that had just begun to lisp a few 
words, caught the remark, and while playing by itself on the 
floor, repeated it over and over a great many times. This led 
me to reflect on the powerful effect of a mother's example on 
the minds, manners, and habits of her off-spring, and no less 
powerful influence that females have over society at large. 
Hence the great necessity of their being qualified for those 
important' and responsible situations, in this life, which God, 
in His infinite wisdom has assigned them * * * . And being 
desirous to act the part of a faithful steward of what God 

" Sturtevant, Autobiography, p. 139. 



48 

had placed in my possession, I resolved to devote so much of 
it as would erect a building, to be devoted to the moral, intel- 
lectual and domestic improvement of females, particularly 
those whose means were limited." ^^ 

A religious motive impelled the founding of many of 
the academies and higher institutions of learning in Illinois 
up to the middle of the nineteenth century. The same spirit 
which sent missionaries and preachers from the older states 
to look after the religious welfare of the people on the frontier 
was prominent in the foresight for and care of the educa- 
tional institutions. Thus the Yale movement was not only 
an educational conception but a religious undertaking as well. 
About the time, though, that the New England band went 
to Jacksonville, the abolitionists, headed by William Lloyd 
Garrison, were stirring the country into a bitter rage of 
sectionalism. Illinois was plunged into the strife of sectional 
hatred so that the New England group — from the home 
states which had produced and supported Garrison — were 
looked upon, at least, with suspicion. They sought to allay 
and assuage that feeling by cooperating with the older de- 
nominations in the state and by trying to find southern or 
western professors for some of the college departments. 

Another obstacle, however, was encountered when the 
New England Presbyterian — Congregational denominations 
first tried to obtain a charter for Illinois College from the 
legislature which was still southern. The law makers were 
afraid of the sectarian influence which might result. Judge 
Hall put the case thus: ''In several instances, acts of incor- 
poration for seminaries of learning, and for religious asso- 
ciations, have been refused by the legislature ; and one insti- 
tution of learning has been incorporated, with an expressed 
provision, that no theological department shall ever be at- 
tached to it. This is another indication of public sentiment 
in this state, or at least of the policy of the legislature. 
There seems to be a great dread among law givers, of re- 
ligious domination, and of sectarian influence. Bills for acts 
to incorporate religious societies, for the single purpose of 
enabling them to hold a few acres of ground for their meet- 
ing house and graveyard have been more than once intro- 

" state Supt. Rept., 1867-8, p. 266. 



49 

duced and rejected. No college, or other institution of learn- 
ing, in which any one religious sect is known to have a pre- 
dominant influence, has ever yet received a charter in this 
state; nor will any such institution ever be incorporated 
there unless public sentiment shall undergo radical 
change. ' ' ^^ 

Judge Hall then argued for the right and necessity of 
religious denominations instructing their children: "If 
religious denominations think proper to educate their own 
children in their ow^n tenets, they have a clear right to do so. 
It is enough for those who object to the exertion of sectarian 
influence upon the young mind, to withhold their support 
from institutions which they disapprove. The granting of 
a charter to a literary institution, confers upon it no moral 
power, stamps no authority upon the tenets of the persons 
who control it, nor affects in the slightest degree, any of the 
rights of conscience. It merely gives to such an institution 
facilities for the transaction of its financial concerns, and 
for the safe-keeping of funds bestowed upon it by the benevo- 
lent, for public and beneficial purposes." 

"In a country, where religious opinions are perfectly 
unshackled, and men may believe and worship as they please^ 
it seems to be unfair, that they should not be allowed every 
facility for educating their children according to the dic- 
tates of their own judgment; and we doubt, whether it is 
not a violation of the spirit at least, of our free institutions, 
to refuse to a religious society, the ordinary facilities of 
law, for the protection of its property, the management of 
its concerns, and the dissemination of its opinions. The 
truth is, that the best colleges in the United States are 
sectarian; each of them is under the direct patronage and 
influence of a religious sect. No college, from which such 
influence has been excluded, by expressed prohibition, has 
been successful. The reason of this seems to be that the 
business of education falls naturally into the hands of the 
clergy. It comes legitimately within the sphere of their 
duties. They are fitted for it by the nature of their studies- 
and pursuits ; while liberally educated men, in other profes- 
sions, co uld only become qualified for the business of tuition 

"Hall, Sketches of the West, 1835, v. 2, p. 206. 



50 

by the sacrifice of their other avocations. Those avocations are 
too lucrative and honorable to be abandoned by men of 
talents, for the humble and precarious calling of teacher or 
professor." " 

The new democracy, moreover, feared that there was on 
foot a plan to unite the church and state to establish an 
aristocratic clergy, and to destroy the liberties of the people. 
Consequently, when Alton, Illinois and McKendreean Col- 
leges and several academies petitioned the legislature from 
1830 to 1835, for articles of incorporation, charters were 
refused. The educational convention of common schools at 
Vandalia, in 1833, with numerous petitions by friends of the 
colleges and academies, caused the Committee on Petitions 
to make this report to the legislature: "In view of your 
committee, three questions here arise upon the settlement 
of which the whole matter will turn. ' ' ^^ 

''1. Are institutions of this character really needed in 
this state? 

2. Is it important to their success that the trustees who 
manage them should become bodies corporate? 

3. Can corporate powers be granted with safety to the 
public interest?" -° 

With regard to the first question, the committee found 
that higher institutions were necessary to furnish teachers 
for the common schools. The latter are unable to exist with- 
out the former. Therefore, it should be the policy to charter 
academic institutions. The other argument, relative to the 
first question, stated that higher institutions were necessary 
to provide scientific men. They instanced such men as Sir 
Humphry Davy and Eli Whitney. "The engineer, for in- 
stance, upon whom we must depend, to survey, and at every 
step of their progress direct in the construction of our canals 
and railroads, must be acquainted with algebra, geometry, 
trigonometry, etc. * * * . We must have institutions which 
shall be the depositories of science — liberally endowed — and 
furnished with apparatus, libraries, and able and learned 
men as instructors * * * who shall write our school books 



"Hall, Sketches from the West, 1835, v. 2, p. 206. 
"Senate and House Reports, 1834-5, p. 337. 
'0 Senate and House Reports, 1834-5, p. 337. 



51 

and histories, and become our authors of imperishable 
famer'-' 

The argument relative to question two, is a legal dis- 
cussion which does not concern us. 

The Committee on Petitions adopted, in part, the 
memorial of the trustees of Illinois College, in the report 
to the legislature relative to question, three. 

"We would state that it can be done without the least 
hazard to the interests of the community. One of the most 
distinguished jurists and civilians in our country, in an ar- 
gument before the Supreme Court of the United States, has 
stated that the uniform testimony of experience, both in our 
own and other countries, is, that such literary corporations 
are, in an eminent degree, safe, and highly conducive to the 
public good, and that, as a uniform fact, they have not been 
perverted from their original purpose in improper ends. And 
so far as we know, no fact is recorded which proves the danger 
of any such perversion. Not only do facts prove the safety 
of such literary corporation, but the nature of the case also 
shows that they are exposed to fewer influences which may 
lead to perversion, than almost any other class of corpo- 
rations. They depend almost entirely on public sentiment 
for their patronage and support, and therefore cannot, with 
impunity, disregard the known interests and wishes of the 
community. On the other hand, they are under the influence 
of every possible motive to regulate all their measures so as 
to bear the test of public scrutiny, and to correspond with 
the known expression of public will. ' ' ^^ 

The committee went on to say that these reasons were 
decisive; that literary corporations had been tried in other 
states and found safe, and "now, why should that which is 
so safe in these states be dangerous in Illinois?" 

"If, then, as we trust has been abundantly shown, col- 
leges are so much needed in our State, and the public interest 
would be as really injured by neglecting to foster them as 
by refusing to cherish common schools, and if corporate 
powers are so essential to their permanent prosperity and 
usefulness, and these powers can be granted with entire 
safety to the public interest, what course does sound policy 



"Senate and House Reports, 1834-5, p. 337. 



52 

dictate! It would seem to be as clear as the sun in the 
heavens. Shall we hesitate to pursue it? By your own acts 
we have decided that it is inexpedient to create these institu- 
tions by legislative enactment, and endow them from the 
public resources. But are we prepared to say that none shall 
exist within our bounds, when they are the pride of surround- 
ing states ? Shall Illinois, with its unrivaled location, beauty, 
fertility and natural resources, which prepare it to stand 
preeminent in the confederacy, expose herself to the denunci- 
ations of all her sister states, by refusing to foster literary 
institution?"" 

The educational committee expressed its attitude toward 
the petitioners for literary institutions by these questions-. 
"Are not these different boards of trustees composed of our 
fellow citizens, and are they not worthy citizens? Have 
they done anything to forfeit public contidence? Have we 
evidence that any other associations could do the work bet- 
ter? Shall we single out any body of men, so long as they 
show themselves worthy of public confidence, and are engaged 
in promoting the public good, and deny them those powers 
and privileges which any association of our fellow citizens 
might justly ask at our hands? Why then, we repeat, not 
grant the prayer of these petitions? Shall they meet with a 
cold repulse? Shall their generous ardor in this noble work 
be thus suppressed? Are we ready to say to any body of 
our fellow citizens who have exhibited such a spirit of enter- 
prise, and labored with so commendable a zeal, and met with 
so much success, we will not sustain you?" '^ 

The committee said that the petitioners had these claims 
on the legislature for its support. "They commenced their 
operations in the infancy of our State, when the means of 
education were exceedingly limited, and the schools of every 
description were few and far between. They do not simply 
prepare to educate those who shall hereafter come upon the 
stage, but the present generation also. The cry now is from 
all parts of the State — educate the present generation. The 
petitioners are ready to vociferate the same loud and long. 
This is the very thing that they propose to aid in accomplish- 



« Senate and House Reports, 1834-5, p. 337. 
=» Senate and House Reports, 1834-5, p. 337. 



53 

ing. They come to us and point to the present state of edu- 
cation in Illinois, and simply ask us to afford them such facili- 
ties as will enable them to prosecute this noble work with- 
out embarrassment. Shall we then withhold from them that 
countenance and support which they ask? It would seem that 
none could be more deserving of encouragement than the 
pioneers in the cause of education. In the opinion of your 
committee, the petitioners are richly entitled to the confidence 
of their fellow-citizens, and the support of ourselves as a 
legislature. ' ' ^* 

Thereupon, the legislature granted charters to Alton 
College, Illinois College, McKendreean College, Jonesbor- 
ough College and the Jacksonville Female Academy, in 1835. 
The charters of these institutions are practically all the same. 
The model upon which they were made was the bill for a char- 
ter for Illinois College, which bill was prepared by the mis- 
sionaries and their associates. The group was made up of 
Edward Beecher, Julian M. Sturtevant, Truman M. Post, 
Theron Baldwin, William Kirby, Samuel Adams, John 
Adams, Elisha Jenney, Asa Turner, Jonathan B. Turner, 
John F. Brooks, Samuel D. Lockwood and J. M. Ellis. 

These men were the founders of Illinois College and 
the Female Academy at Jacksonville, in 1829 and 1830. The 
legislature was petitioned by these institutions for charters 
almost immediately. J. M. Sturtevant, in his sketch of 
Theron Baldwin, said that the latter 's arguments for charters 
for these institutions, before the Senate Educational Com- 
mission, were so able that the committee adopted them as 
their own in reporting the bill favorably. 

The assumption that the Jacksonville group of men were 
familiar with the charter of Yale College is probably true. 

1. The Yale charter of 1701, amended in 1723, '' provides 
that the number of said trustees be not under seven nor above 
Eleven. " ^^ The Jacksonville charters named eleven trustees. 

2. The objects stated in the two sets of charters are 
similar: ''Wherein Youth may be instructed in the Arts 
and Sciences who through the blessing of Almighty God may 
be fitted for Publick employment in Church and Civil 

"Senate and House Reports, 1834-5, p. 337. 
"Tale Unl, Cat., 1913-14, p. 63. 



54 

State. "-^ The Jacksonville charters stated that the ''object 
of said corporations shall be the promotion of the general 
interest of education, and to qualify young men to engage in 
the several employments and professions of society, and to 
discharge honorably and usefully the various duties of 
]ife."^« 

3. The corporate powers of the Yale charter of 1745, said, 
"Thomas Clap, etc., shall be an Incorporate Society or Body 
Corporate and Politic and shall hereafter be called and 
known by the name of the President and Fellows of Yale 
College in New Haven, and that by the same name they and 
their Successors shall and may have perpetual Succession, 
and shall and may be Persons in the Law capable to plead and 
be impleaded, defend and be fended, and answer and be 
answered unto; and also to have, take, possess, acquire, 
purchase, or otherwise receive Lands, Tenements, Heredita- 
ments, Goods, Chattels, or other Estates * * * to grant, de- 
mise, lease, use, manage or improve for the Good and benefit 
of the said college. ' ' " 

The corporate powers of Illinois College were : "To 
have perpetual succession, to make contracts, to sue, and be 
sued, implead and be impleaded, to grant and receive by its 
corporate name, and to do all the other acts as natural per- 
sons may; to accept, acquire, purchase or sell property, real, 
personal and mixed, in all lawful ways ; to use, employ, man- 
age, and dispose of all such property, and all money belong- 
ing to said corporation, in such manner as shall seem to the 
trustees best adapted to promote the objects of afore- 
mentioned." ^^ 

4. The Yale corporation "shall and may hereafter have 
a common Seal * * * and this same Seal to alter, break, and 
make new as they think fit."^^ Illinois College was "to 
have a common seal, and to alter or change the same. ' ' " 

5. The Yale charter gave the trustees power "to make 
* * * all such wholesome and reasonable Laws, Rules and 
Ordinances, not repugnant to the Laws of England, nor the 
Laws of this Colony.""^ The Jacksonville charter gave the 
trustees power "to make such by-laws for its regulation 

»Yale Univ. Cat., 1913-14. p. 63. 

*' Session Laws, 1835-45; Session Laws 1835, p. 177. 
« Session Laws 1835-45; Session Laws 1835, p. 177. 
»Yale Uni. Cat., 1913-14. p. 63. 



55 

as are not inconsistent with the constitution and the laws 
of the United States or this State." -^ 

6. The President in Yale College ''shall have power to 
give and confer all such Honors, Degrees or Licenses as are 
usually given in Colleges or Universities, upon such as they 
shall think worthy thereof."^' The trustees of institutions 
granting degrees had the power "to confer on such persons 
as may be considered worthy, such academical or honorary 
degrees as are usually conferred by similar institutions.""^ 

7. The charter of 1701 provided that the trustees could 
''have, accept, acquire, purchase or otherwise lawfully enter 
any Lands, Tenements and Hereditaments to the use of School, 
not exceeding the value of five hundred Pounds per Ann."-^ 
All literary charters granted in Illinois after 1830, limited the 
amount of property held. "The lands, tenements, heredita- 
ments, to be held in perpetuity, in virtue of this act * * * 
shall not exceed six hundred and forty acres." ^° 

8. The act of 1792 made lay members eligible to the 
board of trustees of Yale College. The purpose was probably 
to release, somewhat, the religious restrictions. The incor- 
porators of many colleges and academies of Illinois tried to 
have a theological department established, but for a long 
time, that clause was kept out of the charters. 

Finally, the general tone and spirit, as well as many of 
the provisions, in the Illinois charters were similar to those 
of Yale. 

Religious denominations, consisting of Catholics, Bap- 
tists, Methodists, Presbyterians, and Congregationalists had 
missionaries in Illinois near the beginning of the nineteenth 
century. The purpose of the churches in sending missionary 
preachers to the West was educational as well as religious. 
Schools, usually academies, because they were the representa- 
tive educational institutions of the period, were opened in 
the more populated localities, largely through the efforts of 
pioneer preachers. The culmination of the movement found 
expression in the establishment of Alton, McKendreean and 
Jacksonville Colleges, for the purpose of educating ministers, 
and giving others a liberal education. In the class struggle 
between the Yankee and the southerner, it was urged by the 

"Yale Unl. Cat., 1913-14, p. 63. 

»» Session Laws, 1835-45; Session Laws 1835, p. 177. 



56 

latter that the former wanted to unite Church and State. 
The legislature, chiefly southern, in 1830, refused for three 
years to grant a charter to Illinois College. By the combina- 
tion of the Congregationalists and Presbyterians, represent- 
ing Illinois College, the Baptists, Alton, and the Methodists, 
McKendreean, charters were granted to these institutions. 
After that, academies were established by charters similar 
to the college charters, the latter resembling, closely somewhat 
the Yale charters of 1701 and 1745. 

The foregoing chapters have dealt with external con- 
siderations; the following discussion is an examination of 
some of the internal features of the academy. 



57 



CHAPTER V. 



SOME INTERNAL FEATURES. 

Entrance Requirements. 

Standardization in administrative organization, entrance 
requirements, tuition charges, subjects of study and methods 
of teaching, is a slow process even in relatively developed 
communities. Only a high degree of social action selects the 
ideal. On the contrary, frontier life provides in its educa- 
tional system those features which suit the ideas, tastes or 
prejudices of extreme individualism. Consequently, the Illi- 
nois academies, individually, determined their own rules of 
procedure. 

Age and mental attainment, the most common standards 
of admission in our present educational system, were used, 
but by no means generally, as entrance requirements to the 
academies in Illinois. Sex, no longer an exclusive require- 
ment, as had been in the colonial Latin grammar school, was 
only an occasional condition of entrance. The academy, 
therefore, was the first institution to grant higher educa- 
tional privileges to women. The statement that only a limited 
number of pupils could be accepted was probably more for 
the purpose of advertising an exclusive institution than as a 
condition for admission. Tuition payment, in practice, was 
probably the most rigid of any of the enti-ance rules. 

In general, anyone who paid the tuition charges, was 
admitted as a member of an academy. Some statements 
made by academic managers in newspapers and directories 
throw light on the entrance requirements : In 1830, there was 
a female department, attached to the Vandalia high school, 
under a young lady, "who teaches girls of any age, and boys 
under six."^ Moreover, ''pupils may be entered at any time, 
and will be charged only for the time of entering to the end 

» int., Oct. 23, 1830. 



58, 

of the quarter in session."- Again, "cliildren of every age 
are admitted, from those in the alphabet, and upwards 
through the whole circle of sciences, so far as they are taught 
in any academy.'" In the Hillsboro Academy, 'Hhe admis- 
sion of pupils is restricted to no limitation of age or attain- 
ment.'" The Edgar County Academy said, ''Pupils of both 
sexes and all ages are admitted."^ In the School for Young 
Ladies, in Springfield, the unique statement was made that 
"none will be received under six years of age, unless they 
are already members of the school or have a place engaged 
in it."*' The Canton Academy accepted, ''youth of both sexes, 
not only as being convenient, but because it is believed that 
under proper regulations, they will exert a happy influence, 
in correcting the morals and refining the manners of each 
other."' The Academy and Common School of Chicago ad- 
mitted, in evening classes, "young men who are obliged to 
pursue some other occupation during the day.'" Finally, 
some academies had room for only a "limited number of stu- 
dents. When that number was reached, no others were ad- 
mitted.® 

From these excerpts, it should be noticed, that no stand- 
ard of scholarship was required as a condition of entrance. 

Tuition. 

One ideal of democracy was to provide education in the 
chartered academies which should be free to all, the ones 
able to pay, as well as the ones unable to pay. In particular, 
the charters of Madison, Washington and' Belleville acad- 
emies carried a provision for the free education of youth 
when the funds of the- institutions would admit that practice. 
Unfortunately, in the minds of the managers, the funds were 
never sufficient. Whether the academies were endowed in 
money or in land, or whether they received their share of the 
distributive school fund for maintaining a common school, 
fees were always charged. Dues were placed on instruction, 

'Sang;. Jr., June 5, 1845. 
* Peoria Directory, 1844, p. 102. 
<Sang. Jr., May 13, 1842. 
^ Pr. Farm, v. 8, p. 71. 
•Sang. Jr., Apr. 4, 1835. 
'Sang. Jr., May 21, 1836. 
«Ec. Jr.. Kd., Nov. 15, 1851. 
•Sang. Jr., Nov. 7. 1835. 



59 

sometimes by subjects, sometimes by departments, sometimes 
by what we may call a curricula basis, and sometimes a fixed 
amount for all work alike. The biggest fee, however, was 
charged for living accommodations. If academies drew 
pupils from regions other than the immediate locality, room, 
board and washing were necessary because transportation 
facilities were poor, roads were bad, streams had to be forded 
and dangerous forests crossed. Inaccessibility combined with 
charges for instruction made the academy a select institu- 
tion, m practice, rather than a means by which the mass of 
the children could be educated. 

Tuition was almost as varied as the academies were 
numerous. However, several classifications of the ways in 
which it was charged follow: 

1. Tuition was placed on subjects: 

Per quarter. 

Grammar ^ 4,00 

Advanced English 5.00 

Higher branches 6.00 

Piano .'.*.'.'.'.'."' S.'SO 

Piano and singing 12.00 

Reading [ 2.50 

Writing, reading, arithmetic 3.00 

Geometry 3 50 

Geography 3 50 

Higher mathematics 4.00 

Latin, French, Greek 4.00"* 

2. Tuition was charged by departments: 

Per quarter. 

Preparatory department $ 5.50 

Junior department 8.50 

Second Junior department 10.50 

Senior department 12.50 

Male department Higher than 

Female department for females" 



"Sang. Jr., May 29, 1840. 

Int. Oct. 23, 1830. 
"Sang. Jr., Sept. 25, 1835. 

Int. Oct. 23. 1830. 



12 



13 



60 

3. Tuition was charged on what might be called a cur- 
riculum basis: 

Per session 

Common branches $ 2.50^^ 

Higher branches In proportion 

Philosophy, history, arithmetic, geography, 
grammar, reading, spelling 2.50 

Reading, English grammar, geography, arith- 
metic, penmanship, bookkeeping, and other 
ordinary branches of English education . . . . 6,00^* 

History, moral and natural philosophy, astron- 
omy, rhetoric, composition, declamation, 
chemistry, botany, algebra, and the higher 
branches of mathematics, Latin, Greek, 
French, Belles Lettres, ornamental needle- 
work, drawing, painting, vocal and instru- 
mental music 10.00^* 

Canton Academy had a similar curriculum tuition : 

Per quarter. 

Orthography, reading, writing $ 2.50 

English grammar, mental and written arith- 
metic, English composition, ancient and 
modern geography, the use of maps and 
globes, and history 3.00 

Algebra, geometry, bookkeeping, natural phi- 
losophy, surveying, chemistry, intellectual 
and moral philosophy, political economy, 
astronomy, natural theology, and the Latin 

and Greek classics 4.00^' 

In the Springfield city schools, tuition was as follows: 

Per quarter. 

Spelling, reading, writing, arithmetic, geog- 
raphy, English grammar, and composition. .$ 2.00 

History of the United States, general history, 
chemistry, and natural philosophy 3.00 

Geometry, algebra, and the intellectual and 
moral sciences 4.00 

"Sang. Jr., Jan. 10, 1835. 
"Peoria Directory, 1844. p. 102. 
"Sang. Jr., Oct. 21, 1837. 
" Sang. Jr.. May 21. 1836. 



61 



'The school fund will not be deducted from the above 



))16 



prices 

4. Tuition charges, many times, were stated as being a 
certain amount for any or all subjects. In the Springfield 
Academy, it was $7.50 per session, payable in advance.'' In 
the Springfield High School, the terms were $200 per annum, 
$50 payable at the commencement of each session. Day 
scholars paid $55, half of which was payable in advance.'" 
Illinois College Academy made a single tuition charge of 
$20.'" 

Often tuition charges included several items of expense. 
Tremont Academy required $95 per year, which included 
tuition, board and washing.=^° In Monticello Female Academy, 
''the expenses will be for the Summer Term of sixteen weeks, 
for board, tuition, and incidental expenses, $44, of which $25 
will be required in advance. "'' St. Mary's, in Chicago, charged 
for board and tuition, $150 per annum, and $75 for half 
boarders, both of which were payable half-yearly in ad- 
vance.^^ 

Frequently, board was particularly mentioned. "Good 
accommodations for boarding can be obtained in respectable 
families at reasonable prices."'^ The principal can accom- 
modate SIX or eight pupils with board and lodging, price two 
dollars a week."^^ "Boarding can be had convenient and 
cheap m the neighborhood for males. I will receive at my 
house, the females, exclusively, at one dollar per week, if paid 
m advance or at the commencement of the session, or one 
dollar and twenty-five cents at the close of the session "'' 
15oard may be had in the village, at from $1.50 to $2 ver 
week.'- The Belleville trustees "said, "boarding in the best 
houses m town may be had at $50 per annum. In the countrv 
very co nvenient to town, boarding may be considerably 

"Sang. Jr., June 5, 1845. 
"Sang-. Jr., Oct. 9, 1840. 
"Sang. Jr., Oct. 21, 1837. 
"111. Col. Cat., 1851-2. 
20 Sang-. Jr., Apr. 17, 1840. 
"Sang-. Jr., Mch. 28, 1844. 
"Ec. Jr. Ed., Nov. 15, 1851. 
"Sang. Jr., Oct. 21, 1837. 
"Peoria Dir., 1844, p. 102. 
^Sang. Jr., Jan. 10, 1835. 
^"Sang. Jr., May 21, 1836. 



62 

lower. '^" In Hillsboro, ''good board may be had in respect- 
able families from $1.50 to $2 per week."-* 

Board sometimes carried with it room also. In the 
Monticello Female Academy, "the teacher and pupils will 
board in his family (his residence is within a few rods of the 
building), the pupils will be under the immediate domestic 
care of Mrs. Corey (wife of the principal of the Preparatory 
Department), and receive every attention requisite to the 
health, morals and manners. They will also be constantly 
under the eye of the teacher, not only in the school room, but 
in the boarding house, whose influence will be united with 
that of Mr. and Mrs. Corey in controlling and regulating 
their habits. "^^ 

Also, "bedding, except a bedstead and straw mattress, is 
to be furnished by the young ladies themselves, who will be 
taught and required to take care of their room."^'' The ad- 
vertisement of the Springfield High School stated that "the 
pupils from abroad will be received in the family of the prin- 
cipals, where they will meet with kindness, and receive those 
material attentions so necessary to youth in the absence of 
parents. Pupils are expected to furnish their own beds and 
bedding (bedsteads excepted) and to have their clothing dis- 
tinctly and permanently marked.'"" 

Tuition charges were made occasionally for curious 
things. "Every student is charged for stationery, fuel, 
sweeping, etc. — one dollar in the winter and fifty cents in the 
summer time."^^ "Each scholar attending the school may 
furnish — cords of wood for which he or she shall be credited 
— dollars per cord,"^^ 

Illinois College catalogue, 1851, made the following state- 
ment for the annual academic expenses exclusive of vacation : 

Tuition $20.00 Wood $ 2.50 

Eoom rent 10.00 Board and washing. 

Ordinary repairs, 2.50 average 60.00 

Library 2.50 Board, per week, 50c to 1.50 



"Spectator, Feb. 1. 1825. 
2» Sang. Jr., May 13, 1842. 
»Sang. Jr., Mch. 28, 1844. 
»« Sang. Jr., Oct. 21, 1837. 
»»Sang. Jr., May 29, 1840. 
»2Pr. Fr., 1846. p. 53. 



63 

The Peoria Academy accepted many things for tuition. 
It made this statement relative to charges: ''Terms of tui- 
tion, for twelve weeks, $4. If a pupil is under ten years, and 
pays m advance, $3. Almost any kind of property is re- 
ceived for tuition at a reasonable price, provided arrange- 
ments be made at the commencement of the quarter, and pay- 
ment be made at the time and in the manner proposed But 
It no arrangements be made, or if payment be delayed till 
atter the expiration of the quarter, cash will be expected. A 
careful account is kept of all school funds received, and 
the same is accredited to the parents or guardian of the 
children. ' ' ^^ 

Sometimes minute directions were given for the stu- 
dent's welfare. ''Students coming from a distance, should 
have guardians appointed either in this city, or in New York, 
Detroit, St. Louis, or Galena, who will be responsible for the 
regular payment of bills when due. Board and tuition per 
annum. $150, payable half-yearly in advance. Washing, 
mending, and attendance in sickness, are extra charges 
Washing, per annum, $18. Mending, .... Doctor's fees $3. 
Medicine will be charged at druggists' prices." 

"German, Spanish and Italian languages, each $15 per 
annum. Books, stationery, etc., will be furnished at ihe cur- 
rent prices, or may be procured by parents or guardians. 
Each student must be provided with two summer and two 
winter suits. He should also have, at least, six shirts,, six 
pairs of stockings, six towels, six pocket handkerchiefs, three 
pairs of shoes or boots, a hat, a cloak or overcoat, a silver 
spoon, and a silver drinking cup— all marked with his name." 

"No advance will be made by the institution for articles 
of clothing except the amount expected to be thus expended 
is previously deposited with the treasurer. Pocket money 
should also be deposited in the hands of the treasurer to be 
given to the students as prudence may suggest."^* 

The School Year. 

There was no fixed school year, as we now know it, from 
September to June. School started when, and lasted as long 
as the in dividual directors saw fit. "There are two sessions 

^Peoria Dir., 1844, p. 102. 
^* 111. Reg., 1847, p. 20. 



64 

in a year, of twenty-four weeks each: the one to commence 
the first Monday in January, the other the first Monday in 
July. The schools are kept six hours or more each day for 
five days a week."^^ In Canton Academy, ''the first term 
will commence on the third Monday of April. ' "^ An English 
school in Springfield began its first quarter March 13th.^^ 
Peoria Institute had ''four terms, of eleven weeks each, with 
a six weeks' vacation. The next term commenced the first 
Monday in May, 1851."^^ The Young Ladies School at 
Springfield began "the first term of the second year * * * 
April 13th. "^^ The Springfield Academy had sessions of 
twenty weeks. The first session "will commence the 15th of 
November, instant."*" 

Subjects of Study. 
Previous to the beginning of the nineteenth century, 
Latin, Greek and Arithmetic were the only subjects required 
for admission to college. Geography was added in 1807, by 
some of the eastern colleges, English grammar in 1819, alge- 
bra in 1820, geometry in 1844, and ancient history in 1847." 
The Latin grammar schools had served distinctly as college 
preparatory institutions, while the academies continued to 
enrich their subjects of study by adding material from the 
college field or by taking subjects outside of it. English, his- 
tory, science, and modern languages for the first time became 
significant. English composition and declamation, not unlike 
the present high school aim in these subjects, emphasized the 
development of correct usage in speech and writing, as well 
as the enjoyment of the masterpieces of the language. His- 
tory received an ever-increasing emphasis because of the 
desire to praise and perpetuate free institutions. Physical 
geography, physics, chemistry, botany and astronomy were 
becoming popular for the first time, because of their specu- 
lative rather than their utilitarian value. The useful sub- 
jects were continually mentioned and taught. The academy, 
therefore, while serving the college, was an institution with 
other objects in view. 

«6 Peoria Dir., 1844, p. 102. 

'"Sang. Jr., May 21, 1836. 

"Sang. Jr.. Mch. 25, 1837. 

3s Peoria Dir., 1850, p. 155. 

=» Sang-. Jr., April 4, 1835. 

^Sang. Jr.. Nov. 7, 1835. 

« Brown, Making of Our Middle Schools, p. 231. 



65 

Tlie academies and seminaries offered at least five dis- 
tinct curricula. But some academies emphasized one curri- 
culum, perhaps, more than another. 

1. In the preparatory department of Monticello Acad- 
emy, "it is designed that this Department shall be equal in 
every respect to the best female academies in the country. 
With the facilities which the seminary can furnish in obtain- 
ing teachers of known qualifications * * * it is believed 
that it will not be difficult to carry out the design. Those who 
intend to pursue the higher branches in the seminary, will 
find it greatly to their advantage to attend this school, as 
books, course of study, and mode of teaching will be specially 
adapted to preparing them to enter favorably on the semi- 
nary course * * * The trustees have erected a commodi- 
ous building on the seminary grounds, in Avhich they intend 
to open a Preparatory school, for the benefit of Misses, under 
14 years of age, and those who are not otherwise qualified to 
enter the seminary."" 

Farmington Academy stated that it had Latin and Greeks 
with other courses, as were necessary ''to enter the higher 
classes in the colleges of the state. "^^ Illinois College Acad- 
emy outlined in its early catalogues courses which were in- 
tended for college entrance. The college authorities consoled 
the public with the statement that, if the pupils did not go to 
college, they were prepared anyAvay for life.** 

2. Very early, it was recognized that one function of edu- 
cation was to prepare men for the ministry. The theological 
department of Rock Spring Seminary was founded on that 
assumption. ''The general plan of study is accommodated 
to the circumstances of the preacher of the gospel * * *. 
Ministers, who have families, and those who are somewhat 
advanced in life, may attend the institution, as may suit their 
convenience * * *. As soon as circumstances will allow, 
a regular classical and theological education will be pur- 
sued."*^ Even some of the academies, such as the Cherry 
Grove Academy, had a provision in the charter which stated 
that one object was to afford facilities for the education of 



«Sang. Jr., Mch. 28, 184.4. 
«Sang. Jr., May 1, 1839. 
"m. Col. Cat., 1849. 
«Am. Ed. Soc, Nov. 1830. 



66 

candidates for the ministry of the Cumberland Presbyterian 
church/^ 

3. The academy was regarded as the training school of 
the common school teacher. The Springfield High School had 
"a department attached for the instruction of teachers."" 
The Chicago Female Seminary said, ''A teachers' depart- 
ment is connected with the Seminary. "^^ Hillsboro Academy 
advertised that ''special attention was paid to those wishing 
to qualify themselves to become teachers of the common 
schools of the state. "*^ Another institution pointed out that 
"one feature of the school is worthy of notice. Particular 
attention is' given to that kind of instruction calculated to 
prepare the student for the practical business of teaching." ^° 

4. Nothing is specifically stated in the charters, consti- 
tutions, or advertisements of the academies that they pre- 
pared men for law and medicine, as well as for teaching or 
college, but often, the object of the institution was such that 
it intended to train leaders for the state and society. Among 
the professions of that day, the ministry was the only one 
that could most justly claim the name. But the lawyer and 
the doctor often studied the languages and social sciences in 
the academies before ''reading" law or medicine. 

5. Although a great deal was said about the practical 
pursuits of society, democracy had not yet been worked out. 
It was only in the process of formation. The academies were 
essentially themselves "class" schools, and vv^ere denomi- 
nated, many times "select" institutions. Following through 
the advertisements in the newspapers, one can read between 
the lines that an appeal was being made to the cultured. 
From that class, usually, the academy received its support in 
donations and tuition. Hence, those subjects were taught for 
which there was a demand. Some pupils were incapable and 
unable to travel the rocky road of Hebrew, Greek, Latin, 
mathematics and philosophy. The object of this institution 
was to give young ladies a practical education * * * and 
to ' ' cultivate the manners and form correct habits. " ^^ In the 



■»«Sess. Laws, 1844-45. 
«Sang. Jr., Oct. 21, 1837. 
«Chi. Dir., 1843, p. 13. 
<»Sang. Jr., May 13, 1842. 
"Ec. Jr. Ed.. Nov. 15. 1851. 
«Chi. Dir., 1843. p. 13, 



67 

New Girls School, piano, guitar, ornamental needlework, 
English, French and Spanish were the subjects of study. 
Another advertised drawing, painting, vocal music, instru- 
mental music, piano, guitar and organ, as subjects of study." 
At this point, a classification of the subjects taught in 
the academies will be made. Again, it is necessary to state 
that no academy taught all the subjects in the list, but that 
most of them taught the languages and the common branches. 

1. Common branches: The Alphabet, Reading, Orthog- 
raphy, Penmanship, English Grammar, Composition, Decla- 
mation, Arithmetic, Bookkeeping, and Geography. 

2. Languages: (a) Latin— Grammar, Caesar, Sallust, 
Cicero, Virgil, Horace and Tacitus, (b) Grammar— fables, 
exercises, New Testament, and classics, (c) Hebrew— gram- 
mar, exercises and Old Testament, (d) French — grammar, 
fables, and classics, (e) Spanish— grammar, classics, (f) 
Italian is mentioned once. It may have been Latin. 

3. Sciences: Geography — ancient and modern, physical 
and celestial; Chemistry, Astronomy, Natural Philosophy, 
Botany, Mineralogy, Geology, Physiology, Hygiene, Medicine 
and Natural Science. 

4. Mathematics: Arithmetic— higher, written and men- 
tal ; Algebra, Trigonometry— plane and spherical ; Geometry, 
Mensuration, Surveying, and Navigation. 

5. Philosophy : Ethics, Logic and Intellectual Philosophy. 

6. Social Sciences: History— English, United States, 
Greek, Rome, French, General ; Mythology and Economics. 

7. Religion: Pentateuch, Harmony of the Gospels, Evi- 
dences of Christianity, Natural Theology, and Christian The- 
ology. 

8. English: Grammar, Rhetoric, Belles Lettres, Elocu- 
tion, English Literature, Poetry and Criticism. 

9. Accomplishments: Drawing, Painting, Mezzotinto 
Painting, Vocal and Instrumental Music, Piano, Guitar, 
Organ and Ornamental Needlework. 

10. Manual Labor. 

To make the above classification applicable, the program 
of studies of the Springfield High School and the Springfield 

"Sang. Jr., Oct. 20, 1838. 
State Supt. Report. 1867-8, p. 270. 



68 

Academy are next quoted: ''The Departments of study will 
be six: 

First — The English, including Orthography, Reading, 
Penmanship, Arithmetic, Bookkeeping, Geography, History, 
English Grammar, Composition and Elocution. 

Second — The Latin and Greek Languages. 

Third — Mathematics, including Algebra, Geometry, 
Plane and Spherical Trigonometry, Mensuration, Surveying 
and Navigation. 

Fourth — The French and Spanish Languages. 

Fifth — Natural Science, including Natural Philosophy, 
Astronomy, Chemistry, Botany, Mineralogy and Geology. 

Sixth — Moral and Intellectual Philosophy, Rhetoric and 
Criticism.^^ 

The Springfield Academy advertised this course of study : 

English — Reading, Orthography, Penmanship, Grammar, 
Murray's Composition, Declamation, Olney's Ancient Geog- 
raphy, Woodbridges' and Willards' Geography, History, 
Rhetoric, Astronomy, Natural Philosophy, Chemistry and 
Bookkeeping. 

Classical — Latin Grammar — Liber Primmer, Jacob's 
Latin Reader, Caesar, Sallust, Cicero, Virgil, Horace, Taci- 
tus. Greek Grammar, Greek Exercises, Greek Reader and 
the New Testament. 

Mathematical — Arithmetic, Algebra, Plane Trigonome- 
try, Mensuration, Surveying, and Navigation. 

French — Grammar, Fables, Telemaque, L 'Historic de 
Charles XII. 

''The course of study has been selected with particular 
reference to the formation of practical as well as theoretical 
scholars, and proceeds on the settled conviction that thorough 
scholarship will be the result. And in the prosecution of it 
the pupils will be required by regular recitations and fre- 
quent examinations to develop a critical and particular 
knowledge of the several studies they may pursue ; and so far 
as may be show their practical utility."^* 

The languages held the center of the circle of studies in 
all of the instruction in the academies before 1830, and much 
of it after that time. Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, a knowledge 

=^Sang. Jr., Oct. 21, 1837. 
"Sang. Jr., Nov. 7, 1835. 



69 

of which was the mark of culture, persisted in American edu- 
cation for a long time and came from the old Latin Grammar 
School ; but the academy brought into existence, as fringes at 
first, subjects of study that w^ere practical at the time. A 
great amount of space and time was spent in advertising the 
utilitarian program of studies by the proprietors of the 
academies. But the owners, many times, preachers, had re- 
ceived the Latin Grammar type of education. It was but 
natural for them to project the ancient languages as the core 
of academic subject matter. 

More than Latin was needed in a new country. An ob- 
jection to languages, written in 1831, showed the trend away 
from the domination and influences of the Latin Grammar 
School. ''The study of languages, when it is made the com- 
mencement or even the prominent part of a course of educa- 
tion, exercises no faculty but that of memory. If we are told 
that the books that are used in teaching the dead languages 
are full of wisdom and poetry, full of original thought, and 
rich conception, I answer that these are valueless, and vapid, 
and pernicious, to the mind that cannot estimate their real 
worth. The ancient classics are full of illustrations drawn 
from the great volume of nature. Those words are all con- 
fined, to the highest and most imaginative department of 
human thought — to history, poetry, eloquence and philosophy 
— subjects requiring the most abstract reflection, the most 
mature judgment, the most cultivated taste ; and it is just as 
ridiculous to carry the mind of a child by a sudden transition 
from the works of Peter Parley to those of Virgil, Demos- 
thenes, and Homer, as it would be to elevate the same child 
by a single step from the nursery to the senate. ' '^^ 

The same writer then gave several reasons why science 
should be introduced as a subject of study. First, science 
has been and is free from local, religious, and political squab- 
bles. Second, science teaches individuals to deliberate rather 
than memorize. Third, science has an inestimable social 
value. Fourth, language made the schools venerate the past. 
Language consists of written records, books are necessary, 
strenuous effort is demanded, but science can be seen on 
every hand. It affords pleasure and interest and disciplines 

"Hall, ni., Mont. Mag., 1831, p. 316. 



70 

the mind. Fifth, language gives words without any meaning 
which is intellectual dyspepsia, but science furnishes the mind 
with real ideas. Sixth, through science alone, can the proper 
development of the country take place. Witness the silly 
arguments against the Illinois-Michigan Canal, which were, 
that the water from the lake would wash all the state away 
were an outlet once made. 

In the words of Judge Hall, the necessity for teaching 
natural sciences was that "these efforts ought not be limited 
to knowledge of any one kind. All that can aid man, in gain- 
ing the highest point of mental elevation, is desirable. In a 
republican country, whose institutions are continually tend- 
ing to democracy; wiiere every change and revolution tends 
to obliterate unnecessary distinctions, to distribute power 
among the great mass of the community, and to mingle the 
elements of society together, it is especially necessary that 
the views of all our citizens should be enlarged and well bal- 
anced. But particularly ought those departments of science 
to be cultivated, which are best adapted for general diffusion, 
which correspond with the genius of our free institutions, 
and are calculated to develop the resources and increase the 
strength of the country. "^"^ 

Of the sciences to be taught, "the natural sciences, or 
those derived from accurate examination of the laws and 
properties of the material world, hold a conspicuous place, 
and it is the object of this article to recommend a more gen- 
eral cultivation of this department of knowledge."" Astron- 
omy, botany, chemistry, mineralogy and geology were recom- 
mended and defined as subjects that should have a place in 
academic instruction. 

These subjects had not been introduced because there had 
been no demand for science. The leaders of education should 
know what science had revealed. "Commencing at the time 
when the frail bark crept timidly along the shore, and all the 
maritime enterprises were confined to the margin of the sea, 
he arrives at the period when the invention of the mariner's 
compass enabled the bold navigator to venture fearlessly 
upon the broad ocean, and visit distant lands, until then un- 
known to the civilized world. He sees the rude bark swelling 

"Hall, 111., Mont. Mag., 1831, p. 316. 
" Hall, 111. Mont. Mag., 1831, p. 316. 



71 

into the majestic ship, armed with the powerful engines of 
war, manned with hundreds of human beings, freighted with 
rich products of foreig-n climates. He beholds here, how the 
most simple contrivances, resulting from an accurate study 
of nature, and an ingenious combination of mechanic powers, 
have affected the intercourse of the world, advanced the 
progress of civilization, increased the comforts, and stimu- 
lated the industry of life. He has also carried his investiga- 
tions below the surface of the deep, and examined the struc- 
ture and modes of existence of myriads of animals who live 
secluded from the human eye. He has traced the mighty 
Leviathan to the profound caverns of the deep, and has 
watched the changing colours of the expiring dolphin; and 
if he has not seen the lovely Mermaid singing on the rock, or 
the car of Neptune rolling among the billows, he has discov- 
ered forms as beautiful, and combinations as wonderful in 
fact as those that are imagined in fable. He has inspected 
the curious shell, the rich coral, the priceless pearl; by the 
aid of science he has discovered beneath the waters a world 
as splendid and as beautiful as the earth itself. "^^ 

"And lastly, the sciences are important from their direct 
influence upon the practical duties of life. In all discussions 
of a system of public instruction, it is to be recollected that 
we are a republican people, that we are the sovereign rulers 
of a mighty empire, that our children are the heirs apparent 
of the supreme political power, and that the lovely forms by 
which we are surrounded, are the raotliers, the sisters and the 
daughters of patriots, and republican rulers. There is no 
useful art which does not depend for its success upon the 
principles of these sciences. Every culinary process involves 
the chemical operation, every mechanic art is founded upon 
the laws of natural philosophy — even agriculture, the great 
business which sustains the majority of our people, the most 
primitive and simple of all arts, cannot be conducted with 
advantage without some knowledge of this kind, and has been 
greatly indebted to the whole circle of natural sciences. But 
especially ought we cultivate everything which may tend to 
give simplicity, energy and manliness to individual character, 
and to cherish industry, economy, and enterprise as national 



Hall, 111. Mo. Mag., v. 1. p. 316. 



72 

virtues. In this country, no man is respected for mere ac- 
complishments, no man can become distinguished by mere 
scholastic learning. But a still further effort is needed; and 
the friends of the diffusion of knowledge should never cease 
their exertions until the word usefulness has been inscribed 
in legible characters upon every literary institution of the 
country, and until a prominent place shall be given to the 
development of physical truth in every system of 
instruction. ' ' ^•' 

Examinations. 

Another of the few sources that showed the internal 
workings of the academies was the system of examinations 
held and the addresses given at the end of the term. A com- 
mittee, appointed by the board of trustees or the proprietors 
of the academies to examine the instruction, usually consisted 
of ministers. The pupils performed for the examiners in 
special exercises, prepared for the occasion, in the presence 
of parents and friends, of which the following is a typical 
description : 

"And first in order, the examination of the school comes; 
and here permit me to say that if they acquitted themselves 
on the last examination in a masterly manner, in answering 
too low, on this — they ran to the opposite end of the magnet 
in speaking too loud, tried by their previous standard. Not- 
withstanding the crowding and the excessive heat of the day, 
which brought into play a brilliant array of fans, every 
scholar could be heard with distinctness by those within ; and 
in a few instances, those out of doors could hear quite plainly. 
We saw sufficient to be satisfied that many of them acquitted 
themselves with credit and promptness and apparent thor- 
oughness; we say apparent, because it is a glorious fact in 
many instances with teachers, that a studied effort is made 
for weeks for this occasion on particular points, rules and 
illustrations, to make a class shine w^ell before an audience." 

"The reading of the Intelligencer, a manuscript paper 
published by the young gentlemen, of the school, occupied one 
hour. An article on the origin of steam boats came, which 
abounded in all kinds of styles save an original one ; historical 
essays, if sententious, should be so linked as to blend the in- 

™Hall, 111. Mo. Mag., v. 1, p. 316. 



73 

structive with the interesting. John Bull and Uncle Sam 
showed that the writer flourished a nervous quill, and some- 
times became so nervous as to lose sight of the truth. He 
ought to hear Dr. Vinton lecture on exaggeration, and after 
that, compose in lucid intervals. A dream started amid 
glorious constellations on its dreamland mission. 'Ye stars, 
how he did soar.' School days brought to many a mind the 
happy hours of youth. 'Prayer' lacked unity. 'The Bible' 
was the most logical piece read and showed a disciplined 
mind. 'The identity philosophy' was touched on lightly, and 
the theory carried out very well. The mystic Swedenborg 
could not have taken a plainer position as far as the writer 
went out. Man was adapted to infinity and nature repeated 
him in all conditions of animal and vegetable life. It was the 
doctrine of Plato in new dress, and furnished for the occasion, 
but we sincerely believe the author was ignorant of the 
ground we walked across." 

"The Paine and Voltaire school received a withering 
rebuke. 'Looking for Items,' was a brief editorial about the 
world in miniature. 'Our Paper,' published by the young 
ladies, occupied thirty minutes. It was read in a very low 
tone, and several pieces could not be heard at all; not even 
the subject was announced audible. This was bad, it ought 
not to be so loud, but readers should be selected for public 
reading." 

" 'Our School Days,' 'Mourners.' 'Books,' 'Home,' 
'Mischief makers,' 'Words,' were brief but good. 'Twilight 
Thoughts ' was stolen goods and publicly appropriated. ' Close 
of School' was a very touching piece. We think, without giv- 
ing a prejudiced opinion, that the young gentlemen's paper 
was the best. The young ladies will try again before they 
deserve the palm of honor. "^° 

Besides this kind of examination, the committee of ex- 
aminers heard classes and individuals recite Latin grammar, 
Latin translation, mathematics, philosophy, and other ordi- 
nary subjects of study. Their judgment of the school was 
based on the ability of the pupils to recite from memory 
formal exercises. 

But the public examinations w^ere justified by the acad- 
emy because, (a) the community had its interest awakened 

^Sang. Jr., July 2, 1858. 



74 

in schools and education; (b) pupils were stimulated to better 
scholarship; (c) studies were reviewed when necessary. A 
writer in the Illinois Teacher stated the current conception 
thus : ' ' But public examinations have great advantage attend- 
ing them. They awaken a more general interest in the com- 
munity at large on the subject of schools and education. They 
furnish an occasion for many good things to be said in the 
presence of parent and pupil. They stimulate the scholar 
to greater exertion and more accurate scholarship. Further- 
more, these public examinations have generally been made 
the occasion to review the studies pursued by the pupils dur- 
ing the year. Nothing can be more useful than this. Review- 
ing studies carefully is the best way to make them thoroughly 
understood. It is true this can be done without any such 
public examination ; but it will be more likely to be done, and 
better done, with it."" 

The public examination was an occasion, moreover, for 
an address by the principal to the parents and the pupils on 
the worth of education. Occasionally, the virtues of learning 
were stated in very modern terms: 

1. Education had a commercial value: "If there were no 
other considerations to prompt you to a faithful improvement 
of your privileges and time, the results in your favor, in 
dollars and cents, should be- considered sufficient to spring 
and keep alive all of your energies, to prepare, for your 
entrance upon the business transactions of life, by obtaining 
the necessary literary qualifications."®^ 

2. Mental satisfaction justified the efforts required to 
obtain an education: ''Mental satisfaction alone may be con- 
sidered infinitely more forcible, and contains enough in it to 
warrant all your efforts. The mind in an entire uncultivated 
state can have but few enjoyments, but when enlightened, 
vast fields of pleasure open before it. Truth is its proper ele- 
ment, and as the various order of beings derive most of en- 
joyment in the element suited to their natures, so the mind 
has most of enjoyment when in the possession or pursuits 
of truth." 

*'To separate truth and error — to detect the rock on 
which your bark of fortune might split — to be satisfied that 

<" Illinois Teacher, v. 1, p. 83. 

•2 Trotter, W. D., Prin. Salem Acad, in San. Jr., 1858. 



75 

your business, when transacted, is done correctly — to know 
what man is, and what he has done on earth — to become ac- 
quainted with the physical structure of the globe on which 
he dwells — the different orders of being which live and move 
through its expanse of waters, or inhabit appropriate divi- 
sions on its surface, and to discover the harmony of all 
nature's operations, as well as her wonderful power to ac- 
complish the beneficient purposes of the Great Creator, in 
contributing to the preservation and happiness of all animal 
existence — are some of the few purposes of mental enjoy- 
ment. ' '^^ 

3. The foundation of a republican government rested 
upon education, but enough has been said already on that 
subject. 

4. Social relationships required educated leaders: "But 
in the cultivation of the mind, materials are gathered from 
social intercourse with our fellow creatures; and as society 
is delightful and necessary to us all, there is an obligation 
resting upon every youth, apart from numerous inducements 
to carry with him into the world a large stock of information 
as he can command * * *. Young Gentlemen ! Who of you 
will step forward and add your name to the list of bene- 
factors of the human race? Do you emulate the fame of the 
truly great? This is the way. Do you aspire to leave a trace 
upon the earth, which the touch of time will not mar, an ex- 
panding field for effort, not for ourselves alone, but to 
brmg good mentally, socially, politically and religiously to 
others." 

This chapter has show^n that the standards for admission 
to academies in Illinois were singly and individually de- 
termined; that tuition fees were charged in all conceivable 
ways by subjects, by departments, by curricula, and by fixed 
sums for all subjects ; that other items of cost were included 
in pupil's expenses, chief of which were those for living 
accommodations ; that tuition charges, coupled with inaccessi- 
bility, made the academy practically a select institution open 
only to those who could afford it. 

Moreover, the length of the school year, the division 
of the year, and the length of the school day were in no sense 

"Trotter, W. D., Prin. Salem Acad, in San Jr., 1858. 



76 

uniform throughout the state. However, nearly every 
academy did retain the Latin grammar school curriculum as 
a center around which other subjects were added to pre- 
pare students for the useful and professional positions in 
life. Besides the ancient languages, philosophy and arith- 
metic, modern languages, more mathematical subjects, some 
social sciences, natural and physical sciences, cultural and 
artistic subjects, and manual lalDor were introduced into the 
academic program. Formal examinations were conducted by 
a committee of the prominent men of the community, usually 
ministers, at the close of each term in order to pass judgment 
upon the efficiency of instruction. Once in a while, the mode 
of teaching was such as to indicate to the pupil some of the 
social values of education. The utilitarian aspect of the 
academy is well explained by the philosophy underlying the 
manual labor feature. 



77 



CHAPTER VI. 



The Manual Labor Aspect. 

To the professions, the Latin grammar school and 
the early academy had ministered, but the great mass 
of the common children in frontier and semi frontier 
districts were unable to rise from their common station 
in life if education were the prerequisite. Although the acad- 
emy may be said to have represented liberalism, and although 
it was a frontier institution, it was essentially, highly 
selective. The middle and upper classes, only, could take 
advantage of academic education. To remedy the situation, 
the idea arose of establishing manual labor academies in 
strategic positions where pupils could earn a part of their 
expenses, where the common child could have the privilege 
of going to school, where habits of industry, morality and in- 
dependence would be taught, and where a literary education, 
comparable to that given in the usual academy, could be ob- 
tained. 

Generally speaking, the manual labor movement began 
in the United States about 1825, chiefly through the European 
influence of the students of Fellenberg in Switzerland. 
Connecticut organized manual labor schools in 1819, Maine 
in 1821, Massachusetts in 1824, New York in 1827, and New 
Jersey in 1830. Besides, an attempt was made to establish 
that feature in the already existing literary institutions. 
Little success was obtained in the older, more firmly estab- 
lished and conservative schools. But the first seminaries 
and colleges were just growing up in the West where new and 
radical features were more likely to be adopted. Also, the 
West was the center from which most of the tracts and teach- 
ings of the principal leaders, Neef and Maclure were dis- 
tributed. Provided with an abundance of cheap land, upon 
which agricultural and some mechanical pursuits could be 



78 

carried on, it was very easy for all academies and colleges 
in the new states to incorporate that attractive and so-called 
democratic principle. 

In the eastern states, the feature was shortlived. By 
1840, practically all talk of the manual labor idea had ceased, 
but the West continued the plan to the close of the national 
period. After the ideas of Maclure and Neef had subsided, 
J. B. Turner, of Illinois College, where the system was in 
operation for a few years, somewhat changed the arguments 
to those that should favor institutions from the common 
schools through the university for the education of the labor- 
ing people. His life was spent in continual service to that 
ideal until congress passed the Land Grant Act for the estab- 
lishment of Agriculture and Mechanical Colleges, and Illinois 
chartered the Industrial University. Thus, the manual labor 
idea in Illinois had served as a basis for the more liberal 
education of all the people, not only for the professions, but 
for all classes. The final realization of many of the aims of 
the original advocates of manual labor came with the intro- 
duction of manual training in the high schools, about 1877. 
A closer examination of the philosophy and examples of the 
establishment of the so-called Fellenberg movement, may not 
be out of place. 

Fellenberg introduced and established the first system 
of utilitarian education in the canton of Berne, Switzerland. 
Experiment began with fifteen or twenty poor boys whom 
he taught w^hile they worked on the farm or in the shop. 
The poor school was attached to a rich school, where noble 
youths were instructed. The latter school gave him consider- 
able reputation and a great deal of popularity so that the 
number in the former was increased to about one hundred. 

Joseph Neef, associated with Fellenberg and acquainted 
with his experiment, was induced to come to the United 
States, by William Maclure, who travelled in Europe study- 
ing educational movements. Neef began a school in Phila- 
delphia, but later, about 1825, taught a school in New 
Harmony, Indiana, where Maclure was sending out tracts 
on the Pestalozzian and Fellenberg manner of instruction. 
The manual labor feature of that system was planned for the 
new country of the West. 



79 

''While travelling in Europe, having observed how 
nearly some establishments in Switzerland were enabled to 
educate, feed and clothe children, by the produce of their 
own labor, in a country where land is one hundred times dear- 
er than in this country, and labor one-sixth our price, the 
idea suggested itself of the great facility of accomplishing 
such a plan here. Circumstances beyond my control, have 
hitherto prevented the trial; but conceiving my present situ- 
ation favorable for such an experiment, I shall attempt it. 
It is more than probable, by the old spelling and horn-book 
system of five or six years' learning to read or write, and 
eight or nine years on Latin or Greek, it would be impossible 
to make children productive either to themselves or others. 
The adoption of some system of education, limited to the 
useful, omitting all the speculative and the ornamental, is 
positively necessary to the success of such an undertaking. ' ' ' 

The principle for the subjects of study in such a system 
was based on this foundation: ''Mechanism, that injector 
of mind into matter, for the use of man which substitutes 
the ingenious organization of inert substances, in the place 
of manual labor, furthers the progress of real civilization, 
perhaps more than anything else. It is more than probable 
that the knowledge of subduing matter to the use of man 
ought to be the foundation of all useful civilization, and the 
people who begin otherwise, begin at the wrong end. The 
study of the simple mechanical powers, such as the lever, 
screw, pulley, etc., progressing gradually toward the more 
complicated calculation of wheel work and the application of 
geometry to all kinds of mill work, the power of running 
water and practical hydraulics, are all to be learned by care- 
ful examination of the machines themselves. The simplest 
machinery ought to be studied first, such as the most perfect 
implements of husbandry, and of all the useful arts. The 
more complicated, for manufactories, such as for spinning 
and weaving cotton and wool, the construction of the most 
improved steam engines, being more difficult ought to be 
learned after the more simple ; but as all mechanism has been 
contrived as our wants required, it must therefore be con- 
sidered as all useful and necessary to the occupations of 

1 Maclure, Opinions. 1819-31, v. 1, pp. 55-63. 



80 

man, and must be learnt in the order of the occupations of 
man, and must be learnt in the order of the utility * * * 
and leaving to the last those inventions which are purely 
ornamental or for the facilitating of luxury. Mechanism by 
its nature, being removed from all delusions of fancy, caprice 
or imagination, as well as its useful applications to most of 
the occupations of man, ought to be the solid foundation on 
which is built the future happiness and prosperity of man- 
kind."^ 

Although natural philosophy was a subject of study in 
the academies shortly after this writing, there is no evidence 
to show that the principles of physics were developed from 
the simple to the complex and made a useful part of local 
industry and life. 

The philosophy of the system of manual labor found 
principally the following values favoring it: 

1. The useful alone is valuable, for *'when we abandon 
utility as the scale of value, we are adrift on the sea of 
caprice, fancy and whim, • without either rudder or com- 
pass." ^ 

2. Mental and physical work to be productive must be 
conjoined. ''The Pestalozzian system has a great advantage 
in all schools of industry, for it not only produces both 
knowledge and property at the same time, iDut gives a habit 
of working and thinking conjointly, which lasts during life, 
and doubles their powers of production, while it alleviates 
the fatigue of labor, by a more agreeable occupation of the 
mind. The teaching by substance or their representations, 
is much more correct and pleasant, than the dry and vague 
description of the master ; and accompanying the lesson with 
muscular exercise, is far more healthy than sitting two or 
three hours on a stool in one position, when both body and 
mind remain under very fatiguing restraint, injurious equally 
to the powers and faculties, exhausting the attention with- 
out which no lasting impression can be made either in adults 
or children. ' ' * 

3. Physical and mental labor conjoined were economical. 
''The care and economy taught by the Pestalozzian system, 



^Maclure, Opinions, 1819-31, v. 1, pp. 55-63. 
' Maclure, Opinions, v. 1, p. 59. 
* Maclure, Opinions, v. 1, p. 87. 



81 

is one of its most permanent features. For the youngest 
children are taught to keep their clothes carefully, to give 
them wash and receive them agreeably to the list and to mend 
them when worn and torn; the only way of preventing them 
from destroying them through life. " ^ 

4. This system saved time in gaining (a) positive 
knowledge. '*By the acquisition of knowledge that can be 
applied to all the occupations of life, and unchangeable 
truths of properties of men and things, that surrounding 
circumstances bring them in contact with, they save a great 
deal of previous time by gaining as much information in a 
month, as they would in a year by the old method. ' ' ^ 

(b) This system saves time in learning a trade. ''To 
multiply and exaggerate the difficulties to be encountered 
in teaching all the arts and sciences, would appear to be 
one of the great objects of all masters and professors; it is 
an egotism so perfectly consistent with the principle of all 
commerce and trade, to buy cheap and sell dear, that it 
ought to be expected; what else could induce a continuance 
of the old system of retaining an apprentice seven years to 
learn to make a pair of shoes or sew a coat, keeping a poor 
child five or six years, tormented with a spelling book? All 
trades have an interest in enhancing the value of the articles 
they deal in, and schoolmasters have no other way of in- 
creasing their consequence, than by giving sparingly the 
knowledge they possess, to their pupils ; and retaining them 
as long under their tutelage as possible, which both adds to 
their consideration and purse. ' ' ^ 

5. Work connected with school was superior to play. 
"Children lose patience, their attention is fatigued, and their 
good-will exhausted by being kept too long at mental exer- 
cises, and their instinct suggests the necessity of keeping 
up the equilibrium between the vital power or force expended 
by muscular action, and the intellectual exertions; out of 
which necessity originated the love of play and amusement, 
through requiring harder labor than their scholastic studies, 
such as crooked stick, hand and foot ball, cricket, etc., all 
creating violent competition, and the useless ambition of 

' Maclure, Opinions, v. 1, p. 91. 
•Maclure, Opinions, v. 1, p. 95. 
' Maclure, Opinions, v. 1, p. 65. 



82 

being preeminent in a struggle that tends to no utility, but 
serves to strengthen and excite malevolent passions of ill- 
will, envy and hatred, habituating them to the unsociable 
feeling of gaining pleasure by others' loss, which is the im- 
moral feature of all amusing contention and gambling. When 
a little older, they follow the sports of men, fishing, shoot- 
ing, horse-racing, cock-fighting, bull-bating, etc., all torment- 
ing cruelties, finishing by blood and slaughter, strengthening 
and augmenting brutal passions, which seem peculiarly 
adapted to our species, from the Roman gladiators, down to 
the British boxers. It would be more rational to amuse 
themselves with the trade of a butcher, because the plea of 
necessity might excuse that cruelty, which cannot be ad- 
vanced for such amusements. It is more than probable 
that all such pleasures and pastimes are the remains of 
savage barbarity, kept up by the idle and tyrannical con- 
sumers, imitated by the ignorant and foolish producers, and 
perpetuated and enforced by long habit." 

''If pleasurable ideas can by habit and practice be 
united with such mortifying exhibitions of human depravity, 
where every result is annihilated the moment the action is 
finished, how much more easy would it be for teachers to 
impress on the tender minds of children the union of pleasur- 
able ideas with Ihe useful occupation of some mechanical 
art."« 

The writer furnished the following example and argu- 
ment of the value of labor compared with play. Labor 
"would furnish the necessary muscular exercise, so con- 
ductive to health, while, at the same time, the gratification 
would be prolonged by the permanent benefit obtained by 
the utility of what is produced, and securing pecuniary in- 
dependence in being capable of practicing a productive trade 
in the case of necessity. The being taught to make shoes or 
coats does not force the possessor of such knowledge to be 
a shoemaker or a tailor, any more than learning mensuration 
or navigation obliges him to become a surveyor or sailor. 
Children ought to be trained and educated to suit the prob- 
able situation, which circumstances of the next generation 
may place them in. Even at the present time all our farmers 



sMaclure, Opinions, v. 1, p. 147. 



83 

and manufacturers, nine-tenths of our population, would be 
very much benefited by possessing one or two mechanic arts, 
suitable to their occupations. ' ' ^ 

6. The professions were already full. In order to live 
in the future one must work. ''Most of the professions, that 
do not require manual labor, are overdone in all civilized 
countries; and in this, it is probable in the next age, few 
will be able to live comfortably, without the aid of manual 
labor."" 

7. Labor would restore equality, and bring independence 
and happiness, the absence of which has caused violence and 
crime. Labor, ''would lay the foundation of a highly useful 
equality and independence ; and would continue to strengthen 
through life, so as to raise them far above all vice and crime, 
for the great and unnatural inequality of property, know- 
ledge and power is perhaps the cause and origin of all force, 
violence and crime, where civilization has made any progress. 
We may perhaps be allowed to hope that the great radical, 
moral reforms now begun, will secure the greatest happiness 
to the greatest number, as the most important result for 
abused humanity."" 

However, the United States would be the easiest place 
on earth to introduce a system of manual labor in its schools. 

"This, of all the countries on earth, by moral, physical 
and all other advantages, is most fit for feeding, clothing and 
instructing children by their oAvn labor. The cheapness of 
land and most raw materials that it produces, joined to the 
excessive dearness of every species of labor, renders the 
experiment almost certain of success, even though it had 
failed in every other country." ^^ 

The location should be healthy, "removed from swamps 
or stagnant water, on or near canals, great roads or navi- 
gable rivers, surrounded at least by two acres of land for 
every child, as a productive farm from which they might 
obtain wherewith to feed them." ^^ 

The house should be "a parallelogram or square for 
centralizing all the inhabitants, that the least time might 

•Maclure, Opinions, v. 1, p. 147. 
^' Maclure, Opinions, v. 1, p. 71. 
" Maclure, Opinion, v. 2, p. 202. 
'2 Maclure, Opinion, v. 2, p. 88. 
"Maclure, Opinion, v. 2, p. 135. 



84 

be lost in changing place. A courtyard would occupy the 
center, and all around the buildings would be gardens, both 
for the convenience of culture and the collecting of fruit. ' ' ^* 

Finally, the cost for the foundation of a system of edu- 
cation, combining theory and practice, would be moderate. 
"Useful and profitable labor are the only means to production, 
which under judicious and economical management will sup- 
port and maintain all the expenses of the establishment. The 
first expenditure of arranging the locality and some outfits 
at the commencement would be the only expense out of the 
peoples' purse." 

''That children by their own labor can clothe, feed and 
educate themselves, is completely proven in other countries, 
and will be very soon in this, beyond a possibility of doubt; 
after which, it will be easy for the inhabitants to subscribe 
and buy a farm; each lending a hand to erect buildings, and 
begin the cultivation, which will secure a useful education 
to their children, with food and clothing, when the manage- 
ment of the whole will be under the direction of those who 
are interested in the success and reap the benefiits of the 
establishment. ' ' " 

Besides the educational tracts that Maclure and his fol- 
lowers published and distributed, the newspapers of the time 
published articles in favor of the manual labor system. The 
Illinois Intelligencer had this to say: "In all our schools, 
and especially in our higher seminaries, systematic exercise 
ought to be introduced." (Riding, walking, climbing, vaulting 
are mentioned.) "They are better suited to the playful feel- 
ings of children than to the chastened affections of riper 
years." (Manual labor takes up the idle time, relieves the 
children from mischief, gives money to the needy and exer- 
cise to all.) "The regulation among the Jews was that every 
child should be taught some useful trade, was founded in 
wisdom and common sense. And what a salutary influence 
would such an example of industry in those who are to move 
in the higher walks of life, produce on the community. How 
far it would go to render industry honorable, how much 
useful information on the common occupations of life, would 
be diffused by the learned through the lower classes of 



" Maclure, Opinions, v. 1, p. 70. 



85 

society. Such knowledge would be useful to every professional 
man in future life, and especially to members of the gospel 
in our new settlements, and to missionaries to the heathen. 
Persons thus educated, if not successful in their profession, 
would not be helpless. Such a system would enable those 
who intend to devote their lives to agriculture, mechanical, 
or manufacturing pursuits, to acquire an education, and then 
to return to business with their habits unimpaired. ' ' ^° 

Convinced that a proper system of education should de- 
velop the mental, moral and physical, the manual labor 
system purported to unite all three aims in one. 

The constitution of the Cumberland Presbyterian Synod, 
published in the Illinois Intelligencer, November 11, 1825, 
provided for manual labor in its academies : ''The committee 
acting as a board of trustees, shall appoint a skillful manager 
to superintend the farming establishment, to erect cabins and 
other buildings, and to take charge of the boarding establish- 
ment : that every student shall be employed in manual labor 
not less than two and not more than three hours per day; 
and for this purpose the whole number of students shall be 
divided into suitable classes. The superintendent of the farm 
shall call on each class in rotation to perform their term of 
daily labor, and shall be privileged to employ them at such 
kind of labor, principally, agricultural, as may afford them 
exercise and conduce to the interests of the institution: — 
that so much of the produce of the farm as may be necessary 
shall be appropriated to the use of the boarding establish- 
ment." The constitution continued to speak of the aims 
of manual labor, most of which have been indicated above. 

Rock Spring Theological and High School contemplated 
''that each student shall labor some small portion of his time 
for the purpose of preserving health, gaining useful know- 
ledge in agriculture and domestic economy, and lessening 
expense. It was Resolved, That a farm be connected with 
the institution. ' ' ^^ 

The education of the Indian, as was to be expected, 
followed similar lines. "There are 98 Indian children — 58 
boys — the rest girls. There are two male, and two women 
teachers besides a man who oversees the work on the farm. 

" 111. Int., Oct. 30, 1830. 
"111. Int. Mch. 24, 1827. 



86 

Four mechanics are employed — six boys work with them — 
learning the trade of carpenter, wheelright, blacksmith and 
shoemaker. These children gradually learn fast and work 
well; and both they and their parents are generally well 
pleased with the school. ' ' ^^ 

Provisions in the charters of a great number of acad- 
emies and schools showed that manual labor was a common 
idea of the times. The Chatham Manual Labor School 
provided that 'Hhe board of trustees shall have entire con- 
trol of the system of manual labor, and shall determine the 
proportion of labor of each student, and no student shall be 
received as a regular member of the school, unless he submits 
to the performance of such an amount of labor as is enjoined 
by the trustees, and the trustees shall account to each student, 
for such labor, which shall be appropriated to discharge his 
expenses in said school. ' ' ^^ 

Moreover, literary institutions as well as specific manual 
labor schools, had a system of labor. Peck described the 
operation of work at Illinois College thus: "There are also 
upon the premises a farm, house, barn and workshop for 
students to use to perform manual labor. The farm consists 
of 300 acres of land, all under fence. The improvements and 
stock on the farm are valued at several thousand dollars. 
Students who choose are allowed to employ a portion of each 
day in manual labor, either upon the farm or in the work 
shop. Some individuals earn $150 each, during the year."^' 

Niles Weekly Eegister, published in Baltimore, praised 
the system in the West. "We are glad to hear that manual 
labor colleges and schools in Indiana, the true and only sys- 
tem of education for democracies, are in a flourishing con- 
dition in that part of the country. We hope the sound sense 
and good example of the Hoosiers will be in a few years from 
this time adopted throughout the United States, and that the 
ancient aristocratic prejudices of cloister learning, will be 
dispelled before the light of modern truth and science which 
is penetrating everywhere through the darkness of obsolete 
usages, and preconceived error, deep-rooted for ages, but 
now to be unlearned. ' ' ^° 



" Z3 An. Rep., M. E. Miss. Soc, p. 28. 
"Sess. Laws, 1835-6, p. 169. 
"Peck, Gazetteer, p. 69. 
"•Niles Weekly Register, Aug. 1, 1840. 



> 



87 

The feature of manual labor continued a long time in 
Illinois though at a later date, it was very much more specific 
in its purpose. Whether it was the cause of the name given 
to the University of Illinois, Illinois Industrial University, 
it will be difficult to say, but the manual labor idea came to 
play a large part in the establishment of a university for the 
working people. 

In advocating a peoples' university, a writer in the 
Prairie Farmer, made use of the manual labor principle. 
''What we want, to begin with, is simply a Manual Labor 
School ; we would call it a Farm School, because there is the 
aroma of a House of Correction about the words, "Manual 
Labor," that is suggestive of juvenile depravity, and of whole 
some restraint, and "hard labor for the term of three years " 
as connected therewith. We want a plain Farm School, for 
the sons of farmers. Let them be sent to this school at any 
age between eight and eighteen, as to an academy. Let their 
education be conducted as is usual in academies, except that 
more attention shall be paid to two brandies, which will be 
practically useful in their future progress." 

"The great distinguishing feature of this establishment 
should be a farm of about two hundred acres, where could 
be kept stock of every description, fruit trees of all kinds, 
etc. Here could be shown the advantages of scientific culti- 
vation ; for unless it is advantageous, it is not needed. Here 
should be tested our theories of manures, general and special ; 
the various methods and modes of planting, and breeding and 
harvesting crops. And here should be solved that Sphinx- 
riddle, "Does farming pay?" 

'Here the young farmer should be taught all that in any 
wise pertains to his future occupation. He should learn to 
analyze soils, and crops ; so as to ascertain the wants of one, 
and the possible deficiencies of the other. He should here 
learn the use of implements, not only of his own trade, bu.t 
of those of the blacksmith and carpenter and wheelwright, 
as well; so that rainy days on his farm should never be lost 
days, as is too often the case. He should learn to take care 
of animals; to judge of their points; and to slaughter them. 
In fact, he should be here trained systematically, as he could 
not be at home, in every branch of a farmers' profession."" 

'^Prairie Farmer, v. 12, p. 185. 



88 

' ' The principle of labor to be recognized, and to be equal, 
according to the physical ability of each pupil; but not to 
be so constant or considerable as to interfere with a due 
amount of study, and heartfelt recreation. The laboring more 
for practical instruction of the pupil, than a matter of profit 
to the institution, though it shall be so conducted as to insure 
the most profit, consistent with the main aim of the instruc- 
tion of pupils." 

''The institution to be open to all, on some basis of 
representation and contribution, and instruction free. The 
productive labor of each pupil to be credited to his boarding, 
and incidental expenses. Nothing but the useful and prac- 
tical to be taught and the dignity of labor and moral worth, 
to take precedence of old custom, and barren learning. ' ' ^^ 

Before considering the common school a summary of 
this chapter, and of the opportunities offered by the academy 
is made. 

The Fellenberg movement originated in Switzerland 
about the beginning of the nineteenth century. Joseph Neef, 
a pupil of and a teacher with Fellenberg, was induced by 
AVilliam Maclure to come to the United States to inaugurate 
this system. After some attempts in the East, Neef and 
Maclure were found at New Harmony, Ind., in 1825, teach- 
ing and distributing their ideas. The advantages claimed 
for the new scheme were : 1. The useful alone was valuable ; 
2. mental and physical work were valuable only when con- 
joined; 3. mental and physical work were economical; 4. time 
was saved in gaining positive knowledge, and in learning a 
trade; 5. work, connected with manual labor, took the place 
of useless and harmful play; 6. new opportunities were 
opened up by which a living could be earned ; 7. above all, the 
system was democratic because it brought equality, happi- 
ness and independence to all; 8. the cost of theoretical and 
practical education was moderate. 

No less convinced were the newspapers, churches, mis- 
sionar^T- societies and educational leaders of Illinois of the 
value of the plan of manual labor advocated by Maclure and 
Neef. Accordingly, manual labor schools were established 
and that feature was incorporated in several literary institu- 

" Prairie Farmer, v. 12, p. 455. 



89 

tions. That idea, more specific, more refined and more ex- 
tended, was the basis upon which the Land Grant Act was 
made, the Illinois Industrial University was chartered and 
manual training in high schools was begun. 

The academy in Illinois was a well established institu- 
tion by 1850. Up to that time, there was practically no other 
means in the state for obtaining a useful, cultural, or a 
professional secondary education. But the academy was 
limited in its clientele because communication was undevel- 
oped, transportation by railroad was possible only between 
the chief towns, and wagon roads, a greater part of the year, 
were too muddy for convenient travel. Consequently, chart- 
ered or private academic institutions had to be established 
in towns where there was the possibility of having a local 
student body. Of course, non-resident pupils were welcomed 
but they came in no large numbers. From the sources of 
student population, sufficient numbers to maintain a school 
were frequently lacking, so that the academy had to close 
its doors or sell to a more enterprising master. For example, 
in the period from 1835 to 1840, Springfield had a succession 
of eight or ten institutions, struggling for a year or so, and 
then passing out of existence. In spite of the short life, 
especially of the unchartered institutions, and several of 
the chartered academies, the academic system was kept in 
existence in the larger towns until the free school law of 1855 
made it possible for the academies to have public support. 
Usually in the North, the weaker institutions took advantage 
of the law, but some of the stronger and well supported 
academies that had less need for public financial aid, con- 
tinued to serve the more select group of people. 

It was evident, therefore, that many of the children of 
the state were unable to attend academies. But the people 
were too close to the traditions of the states from whence 
they migrated not to make attempts to provide some of the 
educational means that were used at home. Hence, the next 
division will consider the common school system as distin- 
guished from the academy, and will show how the upper part 
of the former ordinarily developed into the free public high 
school, and the means l3y which the latter was permitted to 
become a free institution if it so desired. 



90 



PART II. THE COMMON SCHOOL. 



CHAPTER VII. 



The Apprenticeship System. 

The educational provision for the well-to-do classes has 
been discussed in the chapters on the academies. The poor 
people from early colonial days on, were apprenticed to 
masters as indentured servants in order to learn a trade or 
profession. Ordinarily, the term of service was seven years, 
but the boys had to serve the master until they became twenty- 
one years of age, and the girls, eighteen years of age. The 
apprentice received no wage in the industry in which he 
worked. His responsibility was to the master instead of to 
the parent. But the master was required to furnish the ap- 
prentice with clothing, food and a home, as well as to look 
after his morals and to teacli him the craft. 

The master had to train the indentured servant in the 
mystery of the craft so that the latter could become a self- 
supporting individual. About the last half of the seven- 
teenth century, a policy developed which required the master 
also to teach the servant reading, writing, and arithmetic. 
This applied to the principal industries and professions of 
the time, namely, shipping, agriculture, household service, 
commerce, teaching, law and medicine. The reading of law 
and the reading of medicine in the offices of eminent local 
lawyers and physicians is but the survival of the apprentice- 
ship system. 

Moreover, the early laws required, quite frequently, that 
the apprentice pay an enrollment and an exit fee. The 
master had to acknowledge the indenture before a court of 
record which made the contract a public affair. This public 
enrollment was necessary to insure both parties to the con- 
tract against the violation of the agreement. If either party 
failed to live up to the terms of the contract, he was liable to 
summons before the police power of the locality. The master 



91 

could be discharged and tbe servant bound out to another. 
The servant was liable to the penalty of a fine and the length- 
ening of the term of service. 

Indentured servants, early in colonial days, were mostly 
white persons : debtors, soldiers of fortune, orphans and kid- 
napped children, all from Europe, as well as poor people who 
sold themselves to ship owners for passage to the new world. 
Not until the eighteenth century did the negro indentured 
class outnumber the whites. One of the prominent educa- 
tional problems of that day was the instruction of all classes 
of indentured servants. The southern colonies required 
reading taught to the negro and the white, w^ith writing and 
arithmetic to the latter, in addition. 

Now the eastern and southern states, by 1818, had not 
given up completely the master and servant means of edu- 
cating the children of the common man. But as has been 
pointed out, Illinois had few eastern settlers until 1830. Con- 
sequently, the apprenticeship system was established by law, 
which was mainly southern, the principal features of which 
were these: 

1. Boys under tw^enty-one and girls under eighteen might 
be apprenticed with or without the consent of the parent or 
guardian. 

2. The mother of illegitimate children should bind them 
over to a master. 

3. If the father was dead, a fugitive from justice or in- 
capacitated, the mother had the right to apprentice his 
children. 

4. Poor children were bound to a master by the overseers 
of the poor. 

5. A copy of the indenture should be recorded with the 
probate judge. 

6. The probate judge, or two justices of the peace were 
empowered to receive complaints of apprentices and summon 
the master to appear in court. 

7. A penalty was imposed on the apprentice for assault 
on the master, or the violation of the terms of the contract. 

8. The apprentice could not be removed from the state. 

9. The master had to furnish the apprentice comfortable 
board, lodging, washing, clothing and so much schooling as 
shall be deemed right. 



92 

10. "That the master or mistress to whom such child 
shall be bound, as aforesaid, shall cause such child to be 
taught to read and write, and the ground rules of arithmetic, 
and, shall give also unto such apprentices, a new Bible, and 
two new suits of clothes, suitable to his or her condition at 
the expiration of his or her term of service. Provided hoiv- 
ever, that when such apprentice is a negro or mulatto child, 
it shall not be necessary to insert in said indenture that such 
negro or mulatto shall be taught to write, or the knowledge 
of arithmetic. ' ' ^ 

11. If a guardian failed to educate his apprentice in 
reading, writing and the ground rules of arithmetic, the pro- 
bate judge was empowered to appoint another master, "and 
superintend the education of such minor or orphan. ' ' ^ 

As late as 1840, indentures were still being made for 
white children, an example of which follows: "This Inden- 
ture made and entered into this 31st day of August, A. D., 
1840, between James Thompson and George Thompson, 
minors, of their own free will and consent, and by and with 
the consent and approbation of William Thompson, their 
father, of the county of Shelby and the State of Illinois of 
the one part, and Daniel Golloher of the same county and the 
State, of the other part witnessesth: that the same James 
Thompson and George Thompson does by these presents 
of their own free will and accord and by and with the consent 
of William Thompson, their father, bind each of themselves 
to the said Daniel Golloher as an apprentice to learn the art 
of Farming, to dwell with and serve the said Daniel Golloher 
from the day of the date hereof, until the 10th day of August, 
1850, at which time the said James Thompson will be twenty- 
one years old. And the said George Thompson until the 17th 
day of September, A. D., 1851, at which time the said George 
Thompson will be twenty-one years old, during all of which 
time or term the said Apprentices their said Master will and 
faithfully shall serve, his secrets to keep, and his lawful 
commands everywhere at all times readily obey, they or 
either of them shall do no damage to their said Master nor 
knowingly suffer any to be done by others, they or either of 
them shall not waste the Goods of their said Master, nor lend 

' Sess. Laws, 1826. 
'Sess. Laws, 1830. 



93 

them unlawfully to any. At cards, dice or any other unlawful 
Game they shall not play, Matrimony either of them shall 
not contract during their said term. Taverns, Ail-houses, and 
places of Gaming they shall not frequent or resort from the 
service of their said Master, either of them shall not absent 
himself, but in all things and at all times they and each of them 
shall demean and conduct themselves as good Apprentices — 
words can't tell — during the whole term aforsesaid. And 
the said Daniel Golloher on his part does hereby Covenant 
and agree to furnish each of the said Apprentices good and 
sufficient diet, clothing, lodging, and the other necessaries 
convenient and useful for said Apprentices during the whole 
term aforesaid, and also shall cause each of said Apprentices 
to be taught to read and write, and the Ground rules of Arith- 
metic, and shall also give unto each of the said Apprentices 
a New Bible and two new Suits of Clothes suitable to their 
condition at the expiration of their term of service, and also 
Eighty Acres of Common Land for each fit for farming to be 
as near as may be to timber and prairie or all timber and In 
testimony whereof we have hereunto Set our hands and 
Scale the day and year first written. 

his 
Attest Joseph Oliver James X Thompson Seal 

mark 

his 
George X Thompson Seal 
mark 

his 
William X Thompson Seal 
mark 

Daniel Golloher SeaP 

As early as 1819, negro indentures were recorded at 
Edwardsville. The following excerpt from one of those rec- 
ords showed the personal and educational provision of the 
contract: ''During all which term the said boys shall faith- 
fully serve and obey all the lawful commands of their said 
mistress. And on her part said Elizabeth doth bind and here- 
by oblig ate herself, her heirs, etc., to teach or cause to be 

s Shelby County Probate Record, 1839-49, v. 1, p. 52. 



94 

taught both said boys to read. Should their abilities enable 
her to so do and also to provide and furnish them with good 
wholesome food, clothing and lodging suitable for persons in 
their condition. ' '* * 

Slavery and colored indentures were closely related in 
Illinois. The Intelligencer, August 12, 1818, advocated a sys- 
tem of indenture with a term of service of forty years in 
which the servants were to be instructed in religion and the 
rudiments of education. "The word 'servant' was used to 
cover a multitude of sins. No matter under what name the 
farmers held their negroes — whether as 'servants,' 'yellow 
boys,' or 'colored girls' — the fact still remained that slavery 
existed in the Territory of Illinois as completely as in any of 
the Southern States. It was not limited to settlements and 
towns along the Ohio and Mississipi)i Rivers, but was prac- 
ticed all over the southern portion of what is now the State 
of Illinois, and as far north as Sangamon county, which was 
then just beginning to be settled."^ 

But Illinois was admitted as a free state. In the consti- 
tutional convention, three classes of men existed — those for 
slavery, those against slavery, and those who wished to com- 
promise. The latter, being the larger, won. The constitution 
was adopted and Illinois admitted on the ground that the 
Ordinance of 1787, governing the Northwest Territory, did 
not apply to negroes already held as slaves in Illinois at the 
time when it was enacted. "The state was admitted, and the 
right to retain negroes as indentured servants was recognized 
and secured."*' 

Slavery was tacitly recognized by the sixth article of the 
Constitution of 1818 in the form of indentures for one year 
with the right of renewal. *' Neither slavery nor involuntary 
servitude shall hereafter be introduced into this state other- 
wise than for the punishment of crimes whereof the party 
shall have been duly convicted. Nor shall any male person 
arrived at the age of twenty-one years, nor any female person 
arrived at the age of eighteen years, be held to serve any 
person as a servant under any indenture hereafter made. 



* A Register of Papers Belonging to Free Persons of Color, Madison Co. 

* The Illinois Census of 1835 showed 304 negro indentures. 

* The Illinois Census of 1845 showed 226 negro indentures. 
"Harris, Negro Servitude in Illinois, p. 15. 

•Harris, Negro Servitude in Illinois, p. 26. 



95 

unless such person shall enter into such indenture while in a 
state of perfect freedom, and on condition that a bona fide 
consideration received or to be received for their service. 
Nor shall any indenture of any negro or mulatto hereafter 
made and executed out of this state, or if made in this state, 
where the term of service exceeds one year, be of the least 
validity, except those given in the case of apprenticeship.'" 

The education of the negro and the mulatto was bound 
up with the system of indentures. The apprenticeship sys- 
tem was, moreover, recognized by the state constitution. 

Two forms of apprenticeship education have existed in 
the United States. The colonial system depended on the per- 
sonal relation between master and servant. The system since 
the Civil War has had no personal or domestic element, being 
a means by which entrance to some trades could be had. The 
former had the advantage by which the apprentice could 
learn a trade and all of its ramifications. Moreover, the ap- 
prentice, living in the household of his master was considered 
as one of the family, on the same social basis as the master 
and eligible to marry his master's daughter, but the term of 
service of seven years was so long that the apprentice spent 
a lot of time in work not connected with his future trade. 
That work, usually, was day labor on the farm, and the ap- 
prentice was virtually a slave, so classed in some of the col- 
onial laws. Naturally, it was hard to hold youth in America 
to the apprenticeship system because they could run away to 
the frontier, take up land for themselves and become inde- 
pendent. Consequently, the system was limited to small 
numbers of youth, either the poor who were public charges, 
or the negroes who could not escape the yoke of servitude. 
The latter was made a slave in the free state of Illinois by 
the indentures, renewable at the expiration of one year. How- 
ever, in all cases, the master was required to fulfill his obli- 
gation in endeavoring to teach or causing to be taught, the 
apprentice. 

The academy provided education for the wealthy, the 
indenture system provided for some of the public poor and 
the negroes; the next discussion w^ill consider the first at- 
tempt for the free education of all the children of the state. 

' Constitution of 1818, Art. VI. 



96 



CHAPTER VllL 



The Free School Law of 1825. 

Before discussing the results of slavery on the whole 
educational system of Illinois, a brief statement of the 
slavery struggle from 1818 to 1825, should be given. The 
Illinois representatives in Congress voted against Missouri 
entering as a slave state. The majority of the people of 
Illinois were angry at that vote. The southern sympathizers 
decided to retaliate. They began to organize a plot to call a 
convention to change the constitution of the state to permit 
slavery. The Spectator, published at Edwardsville, exposed 
the undertaking, with the result that the plan for calling a 
constitutional convention failed for the time being. In 1822, 
senators, representatives, a governor and legislators were to 
be elected. The anti-slavery men won the congressional elec- 
tion and the governorship, but the pro-slavery men succeeded 
in winning a majority of the seats in the state legislature. 
Shameful proceedings were carried through the state legis- 
lature and a resolution was passed for a constitutional con- 
vention. Organizations were built up on both sides. The pro- 
slavery men established a central organization at Vandalia 
with committees in all the counties of the state. A secret 
convention was held by the anti-slavery men, made up of 
Rev. J. M. Peck, thirty other preachers and Governor Coles. 
Pamphlets were distributed by the thousands to the people 
of Illinois, through this organization, Birkbeck, the English 
farmer of southern Illinois, Avrote excellent articles against 
slavery which were very effective. Coles bought the Intelli- 
gencer, published at Vandalia, and had copies containing 
much anti-slavery material sent to the old subscribers even 
if they failed to pay their subscriptions. When the vote came 
for a convention and slavery it was defeated. 

The results of the victory, at least to the people of Illi- 
nois, were very great. The question, whether Illinois should 



97 

be a slave or a free state, was settled forever. A contest with 
the federal government over the question of changing the 
constitution, through which Illinois entered the Union, to one 
that would recognize slavery, Avas prevented. Free jahor, the 
energetic and progressive farmer with the merchant and 
professional men from the East, developed the country other- 
wise impossible with slavery tacitly recognized. Finally, 
southern immigration with its institutions, was checked. The 
easterner began to supplant the southerner. New ideas of 
the rights of the children of the common man were brought 
along. The New^ England common school began to be ad- 
vocated. 

However, a few leaders, such as General Duncan, Rev. 
Peck and Governor Coles saw the tremendous importance 
of the education of the children of the state, before many 
New Englanders had arrived. These leaders believed that 
slavery and ignorance were the twin relics of barbarism. The 
surest way to save the state from the blight of slavery was 
through enlightenment. The older people were, perhaps, 
beyond the direct influence of schools, but the youth must be 
taught the evils of slavery and ignorance, in free schools 
provided by the state, in order to insure the future of the 
state and the Republic. The preamble of the Free School 
Law of 1825 was the classic statement of those ideals: 

''To enjoy our rights and liberties, we must understand 
them; — their security and protection ought to be the first 
object of a free people; — and it is a well established fact no 
nation has ever continued long in the enjoyment of civil and 
political freedom, which was not both virtuous and enlight- 
ened; — and believing that advancement of literature always 
has been, and ever will be the means of developing more fully 
the rights of man; — that the mind of every citizen of every 
republic, is the common property of society, and constitutes 
the basis of its strength and happiness; — it is considered the 
peculiar duty of a free government, like ours, to encourage 
and extend the improvement and cultivation of the intellect- 
ual energies of the whole. Therefore,"^ 

The free school law of 1825 w^as unique in that, at that 
time, there were only a few states in the East that had a free 



» Sess. Laws, 1825, p. 121. 



98 

school law. The essential features of the law provided that 
a school system was to be established by law ; that the school 
was to be free to all children between certain ages, and that 
all expenses for the schools thus established should be met 
by a general tax upon property : 

''Sec. 1 — Be it enacted by the people of the State of Illi- 
nois represented in the General Assembly, That there shall 
be established a common school or schools in each of the 
counties of this state, which shall be open and free to every 
class of white citizens between the ages of five and twenty- 
one years: Provided, That persons over the age of twenty- 
one years, may be admitted into such schools, on such terms 
as the trustees of the school may prescribe * * *." 

"Sec. 15 — Be it further enacted, That for the encourage- 
ment and support of schools, respectively established within 
this state, according to this act, there shall be appropriated, 
for that purpose, two dollars out of every hundred thereafter 
to be received in the treasury of this state; also, five-sixths 
of the interest arising from the school fund ; which shall be 
divided annually between the different counties of this state, 
in proportion to the number of white inhabitants in each 
county, under the age of twenty-one years, after the next 
census shall be taken; until which time no dividend shall 
be taken. "^ 

Finally, school districts were to be incorporated by the 
action of the county commissioners' courts, upon a petition of 
a majority of the qualified voters of any settlement. The 
voters in each district, by a majority of the votes, could levy 
a tax not exceeding one-half per centum on property, and ap- 
point trustees and other officers to manage the system. Since 
the origin of the bill is a disputed question in Illinois educa- 
tion, an examination of the evidence is pertinent. The author, 
ship of the free school law was generally attributed to General 
Duncan, a member of the Senate from Madison county, after- 
wards elected to Congress and the governorship of the state, 
who introduced it in the upper branch of the legislature.^ 
Whether or not he was the author has been difficult to de- 
termine. At least, he was its ardent supporter in and out of 
the legislature, but he evaded the issue when asked by a 

^Sess. Laws. 1825, pp. 121-25. 
»Sen. Jr., 1824-25, p. 220. 



99 

political opponent at home if he were not the author of the 
free school system which taxed the rich for the benefit of the 
poor. Duncan acknowledged that he had introduced the bill, 
and had supported it with uncommon zeal, in the belief that 
it would be found beneficial to the state, but he did not say 
that he had formulated its principles.* 

Governor Coles was an enthusiastic advocate, if not the 
author, of the bill. Coles was having a bitter personal and 
political fight over slavery. Southern sympathizers sued him 
for liberating the slaves that he had brought to Illinois from 
Virginia. The basis for the damage claim was that other 
slave owners would be influenced to do likewise. Coles was 
burned in effigy in many towns of southern Illinois on account 
of his powerful anti-slavery influence. Hence, it seems likely 
that General Duncan, a long-time resident of the state as well 
as a successful Indian fighter, was put forward to introduce 
the bill with the least likelihood of opposition. 

Moreover, Governor Coles was the type of man from 
whom such a bill was most likely to eminate. He was a Vir- 
ginian of the aristocracy, the secretary to James Madison, a 
special ambassador to Eussia, and personally acquainted with 
the leading statesmen of his day. Several letters were ex- 
changed between Coles and Jefferson, who were personal ac- 
quaintances, on the subjects of slavery and education. To free 
his slaves. Coles went to Illinois. But he also had in mind 
Jefferson ^s ideals of raising the lot of the common white man. 

In Governor Coles' paper, just after the free school law 
was passed, appeared a great deal of material on the subject 
of free education. The purpose of those writings was evi- 
dently in support of the establishment of an educational sys- 
tem for the poor man. The first article worthy of notice was an 
excerpt from the fourth annual report of the acting super- 
intendent of the common schools in the state of New York. 
It showed the legislature of that state how much money was 
paid out of the state treasury, how much was raised from the 
local school fund, and how much was raised by tax, all for the 
common schools. How many children were being taught, and 
how much money was being appropriated, showed the impor- 

< Spectator, May 27, 1826. 



100 

tance of the common school system and the wisdom and mag- 
nanimity of the legislature.^ 

That article was valuable data in showing the same prin- 
ciples of support for public education in operation in New 
York, the same principles having been established by the law 
of 1825. 

The next article, on the ignorance of the peasantry of 
France, should be interpreted as showing the necessity for 
free common education, before republican liberty and the 
elective franchise could mean anything to the people of 
Illinois. 

' ' The Peasantry of France are extremely ignorant. Whole 
villages may be found, where not more than three or four can 
read. Even in the immediate vicinity of Paris, and within the 
echoes of the legislative debates, there are towns in which 
not three newspapers are taken, and those not by persons who 
actually belong to the people. The eloquent pleas for liberty 
are of no effect, for they are not heard by the mass of the 
nation. Hence no general political spirit exists, except when 
the popularity of individuals is concerned, or as taxes of the 
state affect private interest, and national attention can hardly 
be directed to refined questions on the management of the 
elections and the free expression of opinion. So great is the 
popular ignorance, that the most liberal policies have even 
advocated the very wide extension of the elective franchise, 
believing it to be first necessary to educate the nation."*' 

Finally, a long third article was the statement of Thomas 
Jefferson's plan for a system of education. Since it eminated 
from "the greatest sage and most philanthropic statesman of 
the age," so the introduction said, the plan was worthy of 
consideration by the people of Illinois. 

Judging from Coles ' messages to the legislature, and his 
publication of Jefferson's plan for the establishment of a 
complete system of education through the university, it was 
probable that Coles planned for a similar system in Illinois. 
The first step was the creation of the free school system, 
which, of course, was the common school. The supervisory 
power of the primary schools should rest with the college, a 
secondary institution with jurisdiction over a territory of 

"* rntellig-encer, March 4, 1825. 
• Intellig-encer, March 4, 1825. 



101 

about eighty miles square. All of the colleges of the state 
should be controlled by a single university, as the administra- 
tive authority, and providing the highest scientific and 
literary opportunities. Jefferson's ideas of a university were 
similar to the French organization of higher education.* How- 
ever, Jefferson argued for a free system of common schools, 
the support of which was to come from those who were able 
to pay a tax : 

''And will the wealthy individual have no retribution? 
And what will this be? 1. The peopling his neighborhood 
with honest, useful and enlightened citizens, understanding 
their own rights and firm in their perpetuation ; 2. When his 
own descendants became poor, which they generally do within 
three generations, (no law of primogeniture now perpetuating 
wealth in the same families) their children will be educated 
by the then rich, and the little advance he now makes, while 
rich himself will be repaid by the then rich, to his descendants 
when they become poor, and thus give them a chance of rising 
again. This is a solid consideration and should go down to 
the bosom of every parent. This will be a seed sowed in fer- 
tile ground. It is a provision for his family, looking to distant 
times, and far beyond what he now has in hand for them. 
Let every man count backward before he comes to the ancestor 
who made the fortune he now holds ; most will be stopped at 
the first generation, many at the second, a few will reach the 
third, and not one in the state go beyond the fifth * * * 
Where is the man whose heart is so cold as not to grow warm 
at the recital of youths like these ? " ^ 

Only little evidence has come to light to show whether 
any free school districts were ever established. Certainly, 
there are no published records of the treasurer showing 
that any money was appropriated out of the state funds for 
the support of free schools in any district under the law of 
1825. There might have been, however, quite a few districts 
established for a short time, and then abandoned. Governor 
Ford, in his history of Illinois, stated that the law worked 
well and then contradicted himself by saying that there was 
much opposition to it. The Sangamo Journal, February 9, 

• The main difference is that Jefferson's Ideas antedated the French ideas by 25 
years. 

'Intelligencer, March 11, 1825. 



102 

1832, said that it was not known that society ever received 
any benefits whatever from the plan adopted in 1825, which 
was not approved by the people. A little later, the same paper 
made a similar statement about this law: "On the 15th of 
January, 1825, an act was passed to provide for the estab- 
lishment of free schools. This act was accompanied with a 
very complaisant and graceful introduction, but the free 
schools were to be sustained only by a tax levied upon the 
district and disbursed by six or eight officers. The prac- 
ticability of this plan, I think, has never been tested, and, I 
would suppose, for very good reasons."^ 

Pushing the search for evidence further, one was induced 
to investigate some of the very few surviving county commis- 
sioner court records of that time. For the law provided that, 
on petition of a majority of the legal voters of the county to 
the above named court, a free school district should be laid 
out, and a tax levied for the support of education in that dis- 
trict. If such districts had been established, the record of 
their creation would probably have been entered in the court 
journal. 

On examination, the court journal of Madison county for 
1825, showed that five free school districts had been estab- 
lished in the county. Also, the same record provided for the 
taking of the census in the county as provided by the free 
school law in order to determine the amount of appropriation 
to be made by the state to Madison county. 

The free districts established in Madison county were 
Alton, Edwardsville, Ebeneezer, Silver Creek, and Wood 
River.^ The record defined the boundaries of the districts 
following the petitions of people in those districts. The court 
orders of which the Alton district was an example, were put 
in these words : ''A petition this day filed for the purpose of 
establishing free schools in pursuance of an act of the general 
assembly, approved Jan. 15, 1825, it is therefore ordered that 
a school district be established to be called and known by the 
name of the Alton District containing the following limits, 
viz. : To commence on the Mississippi River at the mouth of 
Wood River and to run up the latter river, to where the sec- 
tional line between fractional sections 18 and 19 in Town 5 

•Sang. Jr., Dec. 14. 1833. 



103 



North, in Range 9 West of the third principle meridian inter- 
sects it: thence East on the said sectional line to the sectional 
line between sections 16 and 17 of Town aforesaid; thence 
North on said line to the North boundary of said Town; 
thence West on said boundary line to the Mississippi River 
and thence down said river to the place of beginning. Ordered 
by County Commissioner Court at Edwardsviiie. 

The creation of those school districts, however, does not 
prove that schools were actually in operation m these dis- 
tricts and the establishment of free schools in them, should be 
had for all the older counties, but only a very few records 
have been preserved. The attitude of the people of the coun- 
ties on public laws and questions of the day was expressed 
and registered in the court proceedings. Petitions and opin- 
ions of opposition on nearly every subject imaginable were 
inserted in the county records. Evidently at least m Madison 
county, there was little opposition to the law of 1825 because 
not one objection to it was raised in these records. 

Moreover, the newspapers published at Edwardsviiie had 
practically no opposition to the creation of free school dis- 
tricts and the law of 1825. At about the same time, as the 
establishing of the free school district, a parent expressed the 
hope that schools would soon be in operation; It has be- 
come fashionable of late to declaim on the advantages ot 
education. Every one who wishes to be thought a patriot, a 
good citizen, or a man of sense, talks loudly of the importance 
of a system of general education, as a grand means of perpetu- 
ating our civil liberties, and improving our moral condition. 

"Now, I have no disposition to check the ardor ot these 
patriotic orators and writers; only, I wish it may not end m 
declamation. Our children will gain but little useful knowl- 
edge from most eloquent harangues in favor ot schools it 
there be no schools established. It were a thousand pities 
that so many fine productions should be lost to posterity; 
that the authors should receive none of that posthumous re- 
ward, the applause and gratitude if succeeding generations 
could not read them.'"" The writer continued to say that 
the tax was not sufficient to provide all the advantages de- 
sired for a free education. 



•Madison Co. Court Rec, 1825. June Term, p. 152. 
10 Spectator, July 30, 1825. 



104 

Another writer in the same paper expressed a favorable, 
though somewhat different point of view : ' ' That we consider 
the late law of our state on the subject of education, on the 
whole, adapted to our wants ; and, we must add, honorable to 
the head and heart of its author. " * ' We have some objections 
to its details, and so we might, possibly to the details of any 
plan."" 

Again, a writer in the Spectator, found the law a means 
of getting the proper kind of teachers, the right kind of in- 
spection for schools, longer terms, less expense and a means 
by which, through experience, the people could tell whether 
the law was satisfactory: ''By the aid of the School Fund, 
arising from the sale of land, with the trifling tax on prop- 
erty, and voluntary contributions, we could offer better in- 
ducements to competent teachers, who might thereby be in- 
duced to devote their time and talent to the arduous task." 

"Schools established under the provision of the law 
would be subject to inspection of a body of men selected by 
the people of each district, whose duty it would be to watch 
over both pupils and teacher, and Imow the progress of the 
school in learning. Thej^ would be permanent, and liable to 
fewer and shorter vacations — so discouraging and injurious 
to children." 

''The expense to individuals would eventually, if not 
at first, be considerably less than the present loose and in- 
efficacious method, and would gradually diminish as the 
school increases. Lastly, the plan, if adopted, would be 
tested. The citizens would then be able to judge from exper- 
ience, and either amend or lay it aside, as they should find 
it advisable. "^- 

Evidently the experience obtained was disastrous to the 
free school idea because the legislature (in 1827) amended 
the law of 1825 so that one could be taxed only by his own 
consent for the support of schools: 

"Sec. 3 — The legal voters of any school district, at their 
regular meetings, shall have power in their discretion, to 
cause either the whole or one-half of the sum required, to 
support a school in such a district, to be raised by taxation. 
And if only one-half be raised by taxation, the remainder 

"Spectator, Sept. 10, 1825. 
"Spectator, Sept. 10, 1825. 



105 

may be required to be paid by the parents, master, and 
guardian, in proportion to the number of pupils which each 
of them shall send to school. ' ' 

<^Sec. 4— No person shall hereafter be taxed for the 
support of any free school in this state, unless by his or her 
own free will and consent, first had and obtained, in writing. 
And any person so agreeing and consenting, shall be taxed 
in the manner prescribed in the act to which this is an 
amendment. ' "^ 

However, Peck stated that, "many good primary schools 
now exist without a legislative sanction, and where three or 
four of the leading families unite, and exert their influence 
in favor of the measure, it is not difficult to have a good 
school."" 

Provision existed by law, nevertheless, through which 
the people of a locality could organize themselves into school 
districts and might tax themselves by consent, but they could 
receive no share of the public funds under the control of the 
state because the two per cent clause of the law of 1825 had 
been repealed in 1829. Upon petition from the inhabitants 
of a township, the sixteenth section could be sold, the pro- 
ceeds funded, the interest from which could be used for the 
maintenance of the common school. "To some extent, the 
people have availed themselves of this provision and receive 
the interest of the fund.'"^ 

The distributive share of the common school fund was 
never sufficient to maintain common schools in any county 
without the supplementation of tuition fees. When a teacher 
desired employment, he drew up articles of agreement by 
which the term of service was stated, usually for not more 
than three months, and the rate of tuition for each pupil. If 
a large enough number of subscribers was received to meet 
the expected compensation, school was started ; if not, the 
teacher went to other school districts to make similar experi- 
ments until a satisfactory list of prospective pupils was ob- 
tained. The following is a typical contract: 

"Articles of agreement, drawn this 25th of May, 1833, 
between Allen Parlier, of the county of Washington and the 

"Sess. Laws, 1826-7, p. 364. 
"Peck, Gazetteer, p. 83 
" Ibid. 



106 

State of Illinois, of the one part, and we, tlie undersigned, of 
said county and State, witnesseth, that the said Parlier binds 
himself to teach a school of spelling, reading, writing and the 
foregoing rules of arithmetic for the term of three months 
for $2 per scholar, per quarter; said Parlier further binds 
himself to keep good order in said school, will teach five days 
in each week, all due school hours, and will make up lost 
time, except muster days,, and will set up with twenty 
scholars, the subscribers to furnish a comfortable house, with 
all convenience appertaining thereto, the school to com- 
mence as soon as the house is fixed. N. B.— Wheat, pork, 
hogs, beeswax, tallow, deer skins, wool and young cattle, all 
of which will be taken at the market price delivered at my 
house, at the expiration of said school, day and date above 
written. 

Subscribers' names. Allen Parlier."'^ 

It was the exception rather than the rule, that districts 
and towns voted to tax themselves for the support of elemen- 
tary education during the time between the annullment of 
the law of 1825 and the passage of the free school law in 
]855. Tuition remained the practice to the latter date. The 
Prairie Farmer, in 1852, said that it was customary to employ 
male teachers in the winter and females in tlie summer. 
''Males get two dollars per scholar, females, one dollar and 
a half per week.'"^ In the settlement of an estate, recorded 
in the probate documents of Shelby county for 1844, a charge 
of $22.50 was allowed for the schooling of three children for 
three years at the rate of $2.50 each, "per year.^' 

Another record contained this evidence on the same 
question: "On this 10th day of January, 1848, came Patrena 
Earp guardian for the heirs of Josiah Porthman dec. and 
made following settlement to wit — credit for the year 1844 
for schooling, $16.00. Credit for the year 1845 for schooling, 
$2.50 each— $7.50. Credit for the year 1846 for schooling, 
$1.50 each— $4.50. Credit for the vear 1847 at $2 each— 
$6.'»« 

To insure the permanence of free institutions in Illinois, 
enlightenment of the youth of the state was thought neces- 

" state Supt. Rep.. 1883-4. p. 104. 
"Prairie Farmer, April 12. 18.52. p. 17.5. 
"Shelby County Probate Rec. 1839-1849, p. 152. 



107 

sary by means of a system of free common schools. The law 
of 1825 provided that a school system should be established, 
that the schools should be free to all children, and that the 
schools thus established should be supported by two per cent 
of all the yearly revenues due the state and by a local, general 
property tax. Governor Coles was probably the author of 
the law rather than Senator Duncan and drew his ideas for 
a complete system of education of primary, secondary and 
university instruction from Thomas Jefferson's scheme, with 
which Coles was thoroughly familiar. The first concern was 
with primary instruction which the law of 1825 made possi- 
ble. Five free school districts were created in Madison 
county within a few months after the passage of the bill. No 
complaint, however, was made against the law in the Ed- 
wardsville paper, or in the county court, but other counties 
must have been opposed to free schools, because the legisla- 
ture repealed the public tax feature two years later and the 
two per cent clause in 1829. From this time to the passage 
of the free school law of 1855, common schools were sup- 
ported largely by tuition paid by the parents.* 

The friends of the common school and the educational 
leaders in the state began immediately to try to put it on a 
firm basis; an educational survey of the state was made, 
which resulted in a memorial to the legislature and an ad- 
dress to the people for the creation of free common schools 
and the establishment of county seminaries for the training 
of teachers. These features are developed in the next 
chapter. 

• The following section of the school law of 1845 shows that tuition charges 
Were legal : "Provided, that the expenses of such fuel and furniture as aforesaid 
shall be apportioned among the scholars according to the number of days taught, 
and collected with tuition fees from the parents or guardians of such children." 
Sess. Laws, 1845, p. 65, Sec. 61. 



108 



CHAPTER IX. 



The Movement of 1835. 

The efforts for the inauguration of a common school sys- 
tem in the State did not die out with the virtual repeal of the 
school law of 1825. Political speakers, the State over, in their 
campaign for election, never failed to mention their ideas 
upon the education of the people. Col. Ewing, Speaker of the 
lower house of the legislature, and Abraham Lincoln were ex- 
amples of campaigners who addressed their constituents on 
the value of education as the means of perpetuating free in- 
stitutions. 

The former said: "This is a subject, however, of more 
vital importance to society than any other. Its utility can 
not be properly estimated, without going too elaborately into 
its discussion. But there is a spirit abroad in many portions 
of this Union, whose purpose is devoted to the general educa- 
tion of the youth of the country, and the establishment of a 
system of schools, which will insure this grand purpose 
through all future time. The honest man, and the friend of 
his country, are looking to a system of schools and colleges 
for the general diffusion of knowledge as the only remedy for 
many existing evils in the body politic. I know no measure 
of its importance. It affords the surest guaranty against the 
arts of the ambitious, and the madness of party. Either in- 
telligence must be generally diffused, or all we hold dear must 
be exposed to shipwreck for the mistakes of misguided judg- 
ment, or the deleterious influence of maddening and factious 
declamation of reckless demagogues, who live in popular 
commotion, and whose object is personal aggrandizement."^ 

The latter said: "Fellow Citizens: Having become a 
candidate for the honorable office of one of your Representa- 
tives in the next General Assembly of this State, in accord- 
ance with an established custom and the principles of true 

1 111. Mag., V. 1, p. 383. 



109 

republicanism, it becomes my duty to make known to you — 
the people whom I propose to represent — my sentiments with 
regard to local affairs. * * * ''Upon the subject of edu- 
cation, not presuming to dictate any plan or system respect- 
ing it, I can only say that I view it as the most important sub- 
ject which we as a people can be engaged in. That every man 
may receive at least a moderate education, and thereby be 
enabled to read the histories of his own and other countries, 
by which he may duly appreciate the value of our free insti- 
tutions, appears to be an object of vital importance, even on 
this account alone, to say nothing of the advantages and 
satisfaction to be derived from all being able to read the 
scriptures and other works, both of a religious and moral na- 
ture, for themselves. For my part I desire to see the time 
when education, and by its means, morality, sobriety, enter- 
prise and industry, shall become much more general than at 
present, and should be gratified to have it in my power to 
contribute something, to the advancement of any measure 
which might have a tendency to accelerate the happy 
period."^ 

Indeed, the necessity for the education of the children of 
the State was pressing. Immigrants were coming by the 
thousands ; the eyes of the East were turned toward the West. 
Should the State grow up in lawless barbarism, due to ignor- 
ance, or should it become enlightened through the schools'? 
All were agreed that a common school education was needed, 
but how to get a system for that purpose was unsettled. 
Judge Hall summed up the situation thus : ' ' Common schools 
have increased a little in number, though not much perhaps 
in character. The defect exists altogether in the want of 
some general system. Education is decidedly popular, and 
all classes were willing to contribute to the introduction and 
support of schools. But how to obtain the desired object, is a 
question upon which there is as yet no settled opinion. ' '^ 

Hall concluded by saying that a local, individual school 
system was practically valueless. A state system should re- 
place it. ''A common school may enlighten to some extent a 
little neighborhood; but in order to disseminate intelligence 
throughout the whole mass of people, to elevate national 

2 Sang. Jr., March 15, 1832. A Lincoln, 
sill. Month. Mag.. Dec. 1831, p. 102. 



110 

character, and to develop the mental resources of the whole 
country, there must be a union of action among the friends of 
education. Our politicians must become deeply imbued with 
a sense of the importance of the subject; and our professional, 
literary, and scientific men must come out from the retire- 
ment of their closets, and the enthralments of their private 
avocations and labor for the public. The subject needs to be 
stripped of many theories that disfigure it, or give it a 
shadowy existence in the eyes of practical men; and to have 
its realities presented in their naked truth, and vigor, and 
beauty. The clouds of prejudice, which envelope it, ought to 
be dispelled, prejudices which relate to forms, to systems, to 
men, and to sects, and not as we sincerely believe, to subject 
matter. Every rational man desires knowledge, and wishes 
to see his children elevated in the scale of human beings. The 
objections are to means, the agents, and the manner of in. 
struction. ' '* 

The education of the children of Illinois was, moreover, 
a national affair. Mr. Gatewood, who championed the bill of 
1835, in his address to the senate, said that the scepter that 
ruled the country would pass from the East to the valley of 
the Mississippi. Therefore, the education of the children was 
primary. 

''The time is not far distant, and many, who are now 
active upon the stage, may yet live to see the day, when a 
majority of the people comprising these United States will 
reside in the Valley of the Mississippi. The scepter must 
soon pass over the Alleghanies, never again to return. The 
North, the East, and the South must soon, in a political point 
of view, be tributary to the West. The Land of the Puritans, 
the Empire State, the Old Dominion, and all, with their an- 
cient institutions, their laurels, their heroes and their states- 
men, big as they are with the praises of other days, must in a 
short time do homage to the great Valley of the Mississippi. 
The liberties of all America must be committed to the people 
of this valley for safe-keeping and preservation. The pre- 
servation of these liberties must depend upon the virtue and 
intelligence of the people of the West; must depend upon the 
very children, one-third of whom, are now destitute of the 

*I11. Month. Mag-., v. 1, p. 273. 



Ill 

means of instruction and growing up in ignorance. * * * 
The subject of education in the West then must be — it is a 
subject of deep and anxious solicitude. ' " 

The time was ripe for the statesmen of the day to make 
plans for the creation by law of a common school system, ac- 
ceptable to the people. Judge Hall, the foremost literary 
writer of the State, was invited to address the people in Van- 
dalia on the subject of education. This opportunity was seized 
to organize, in 1833, ''The Illinois Institute of Education," 
the purpose of which, as stated in the constitution of the so- 
ciety, ''shall be the advancement of education in Illinois, 
especially in the common schools. ' ' 

After re-affirming the belief in the value of education as 
the savior of republican institutions, the association decided 
on three lines of action : 

"1. Information can be obtained from every county in 
the State of the numbers and condition of primary schools, 
the time for which they are taught in a year, the average 
number of scholars that attend, the branches taught, the 
books received, and the mode of instruction pursued, the cost 
for each school, or even for each scholar, the probable number 
of children who ought to receive aid from public funds, and 
many other particulars relative to the present condition of 
the primary schools of this State." 

"2. Correspondence with public institutions and in- 
dividuals in other states would furnish legislative documents 
relative to school statistics, plans of operation, application of 
public funds, qualifications of teachers, and the branches 
taught in different parts of the country, the various results of 
public and private munificence, and many other facts." 

"3. Through the channels of the press, and by public ad- 
dresses, information may be throAvn before the public. ' '*^ 

The literature of the time carried this notice and these 
questions relative to the first plan of the association in which 
a survey of the primary educational status of the State was 
to be made: 

"Friends of education, teachers and preachers of the 
gospel throughout the State are requested to correspond with 



^ Sen. Rep. on Educ, Doc. No. 8, p. 
6 State Supt. Rep.. 1885-6, p. 110. 



112 

John Russell, Esq., Postmaster, Bluff dale, Greene County, and 
to furnish such information as may be in their power on the 
topics involved in the following questions. The information 
of ladies as well as gentlemen is requested. And gentlemen 
out of the State are solicited to furnish the Institute with 
such facts and documents as may be needed, to be addressed 
to J. M. Peck, Postmaster, Rock Spring, St. Clair County. 

1. What kind of a schoolhouse have you? 2. How many 
months in a year is school taught? 3. What is the cost of 
your school per annum, including pay of teacher, books, fuel, 
and repairs of schoolhouse? 4. What is the cost per scholar? 
5. How many different scholars attend ? 6. What is the aver- 
age number of scholars? 7. How many children need aid 
from public funds. 8. How many schools in the county? 
9. What branches are taught in your schools? 10. What 
books are used in spelling? In reading? In arithmetic? In 
geography? In grammar? 11. Are the elements of natural 
history taught? 12. Does your teacher lecture the scholars 
on the branches of science? 13. Does he ask questions on 
every reading lesson? 14. How many adults in your settle- 
ment who cannot read? 15. Have you a public library, and 
if so, how large, and under what regulations? 16. Could not 
a small library of useful books be had for the use of your 
school, and loaned to the scholars as rewards for proficiency 
in study, and good behavior? 17. Would you like to have a 
good teacher permanently settled with you, and would the 
school support him ? 18. How would a circuit teacher do who 
should conduct four or five schools, visiting them once a week 
as teachers of singing do, and lecturing and explaining the 
branches taught? 19. What measures, in your opinion, or 
those of the people around you should the State adopt in rela- 
tion to school funds? 20. Can you get up meetings of the 
people on court day, or any other convenient time, on the sub- 
ject of education? 21. Will any gentleman make public ad- 
dresses, or deliver lectures to the people on the subject of 
education and schools? 22. What proportions of the families 
take newspapers, or any other periodical?'" 

The information contained in these questions became the 
subject matter for the second meeting of the Illinois Institute, 

'State Supt. Rep., 1885-6, p. 111. 



113 

convened in December, 1834, at Vandalia, at the same time 
and place as the General Assembly. The deliberations of the 
educational convention were formulated in an address to the 
people of Illinois, and in a memorial to the legislature. 

''A well devised system of primaiy schools will secure to 
their families increased prosperity and happiness to their 
country, wealth, glory and freedom."* The means of provid- 
ing common free education were stated in three ways: 
1. Massachusetts had a policy of taxation exclusively; 2. Con- 
necticut had the interest from a vested fund; 3. New York 
had the combination of the first and second plan — a tax and 
the interest on a vested fund. These three plans were con- 
cretely described and the position of Illinois in comparison 
was found most favorable, the New York plan being recom- 
mended. 

But the whole heart of the system to be established, said 
the address, rested on the teacher who must be trained in 
special schools. ''One of the great defects in the common 
schools of New England and New York is the incompetency 
of their teachers. * * * A child under competent instruc- 
tion will acquire as much learning in three years, as is com- 
monly attained in six under existing teaching, and hence, it is 
the interest of the people to employ skillful instructors. 
Would you trust the shoeing of your horse to any but a smith T 
You would not. Then we pray you by your parental affec- 
tions, to pause, before you commit the education of your in- 
fant and immortal children, into the hands of men, ignorant 
of the laws of physics, and totally unused in the operation of 
the human intellect. If the blacksmith should learn his trade, 
surely the school teacher should study his profession."^ 

The Institute recommended to the legislature, in accord- 
ance with those ideas, the following principles to be estab- 
lished by law: 1. The citizens of a community shall elect 
their trustees and teacher and a majority of the citizens of a 
district may petition the county commissioner's court to lay 
off a school district. 2. ''The teacher shall be required to 
keep a schedule, exhibiting the names and number of scholars, 
and the number of days that they respectively attend school, 

« state Supt. Rep., 1885-6, p. 117. 
•State Supt. Rep., 1885-6, p. 119. 



114 

and that all the funds distributed by the laws of the State for 
payment of teachers' wages, be apportioned according to the 
whole number of days which all the children shall have at- 
tended school, as shall appear from a copy of said schedule 
made out and sworn to by the teacher, and approved by the 
trustees of the school. "^° 

3. The interest of the college and seminary fund should 
be loaned to the common school fund, but preserving the in- 
tegrity of the former for future use. The interests of the 
State shall be better served by sectional seminaries rather 
than by one central institution. 

4. The distribution of the interest from the school fund 
shall be made by the county school commissioner of each 
county on the basis of population, according to the last 
census. 

5. The distributive share of each county shall be used for 
the payment of teachers' salaries. 

6. * ' The State shall contribute an annual sum to the sup- 
port of at least one respectable academy in each county, when 
the people thereof shall have first put the same into actual 
operation, ' '^^ 

7. ''Before any part of the money in the hands of the 
school commissioner be distributed by him for the support of 
the teacher, though citizens wishing to derive the benefits 
from it shall first erect and furnish a substantial and com- 
fortable schoolhouse, agree to supply the same with necessary 
fuel, and engage to pay at least one-half of the wages of the 
teacher, and shall have a school taught at least three 
months." ^^ 

The result of the recommendations of the State Teacher's 
Association was the proposal of a system of education, made 
in the Senate, Feb. 5, 1835, for a uniform system of common 
schools and county seminaries throughout the State. 

The bill of 1835 had some very interesting and unique 
features, among which, were those that related to the creation 
of county seminaries. Those institutions were to be organ- 
ized as public joint stock companies which have been de- 
scribed in Chapter III. After three months of operation, the 



"State Supt. Rep. 1885-6, p. 121. 
«Ibid. p. 121, 



115 

State was required to pay annually to each seminary the sum 
of two hundred dollars. In turn, the State required those who 
expected to teach to sign a contract with the trustees of the 
seminary to teach in the county twice as long as the term re- 
quired for qualification. Moreover, the commissioner of the 
seminary fund was authorized to pay to the trustees of these 
academies, the tuition of all persons who were qualifying 
themselves to teach. 

Like the law of 1825, this bill made common schools free 
to all white children. As the law of 1825 was repealed, so the 
unusual provision for taxation in the bill of 1835 was de- 
feated. The State was unready to assume the burden of edu- 
cating its children and training its teachers free. 

New York was still paying tuition for the education of 
its common school children. . Pennsylvania passed a free 
school law in 1834-5, which caused a great deal of opposition 
in the legislature and in the State. Ohio and Indiana were 
struggling along with no common school system provided. 
The entire country still had some vestiges of the colonial sys- 
tem of apprenticeship education. 

It is true, that nearly twenty-five years passed before the 
establishment of a normal school in Illinois. However, in 
1835, scarcely a teacher training institution existed in the 
whole country. One of the new educational doctrines of the 
day was the professional training of teachers. Men like 
Stowe, who had gone to Europe to study the Prussian school 
system, advocated teacher training. If the older states were 
unready to establish normal schools, even as private ventures, 
Illinois should not be censured for failing to adopt that part 
of the bill providing for the establishment of county semi- 
naries. Those institutions would, in all probability, have 
been doomed to failure. 

The academies already organized, both public and pri- 
vate, did the best they could to educate teachers for the com- 
mon schools. It is unlikely, however, that any academic in- 
stitution provided more than a narrow scholastic education 
for prospective teachers, although the charters of some insti- 
tutions stated that the qualification of teachers was one of 
their objects. The published programs of studies showed no 
professional subjects in the academic curricula. A thorough 



116 

preparation in reading, writing, spelling and arithmetic, with 
an attempted mastery of the classic languages, was consid- 
ered sufficient preparation for those who were to teach in the 
primary schools. 

In fact, nearly anyone with a little training in the elemen- 
tary subjects was thought capable of teaching. Here and 
there was an occasional objection by some fairly capable 
judge to the work of teachers in the common schools. Thus a 
writer in the Warsaw Signal believed that some teachers 
were careless, indolent, ignorant and without the least desire 
to find out what was expected of them. "Teachers are frail 
mortals, as well as the rest of us; and some of them, I may 
say with truth, a little more frail than their employers. I 
conceive it to be one of the worst evils of our system, that it 
has a tendency to make teachers careless, and indolent; and 
it has been operating so long, that many of them do not seem 
to care whether they do their duty or not; and any number 
of them in my opinion, do not even go to the trouble of in- 
quiring what their duty is. I only make these remarks that 
they may do good, if so be where there is good to be done, 
that whosoever the shoe pinches may wear it.'"^ 

An extremely severe, and probably just indictment of the 
common school teacher of the State was that given by one of 
its educational leaders. The first common school journal of 
Illinois, published in 1837, had but one year's existence be- 
cause the teachers were unable to understand its methods and 
because of the little interest in primary education. "We 
apprehend there is not sufficient intelligence among the mass 
of teachers in the State to appreciate the merits of such a 
work, nor interest enough taken by parents in the success of 
common schools, or in the education of their children, to in- 
duce them to extend, at the present time, an adequate support 
to the enterprise.'"^ 

From our point of view, we could expect little of teachers 
because little was expected of them by the people. A circuit 
teacher was surely less efficient than a circuit preacher. Oc- 
casionally, a circuit teacher had as many as three schools to 
teach, as well as supply the books. However, that method 



"■Warsaw Signal, Feb. 2, 1842. 
" 111. Hist. Col., V. 6, p. 63. 



117 

had its adherents who stated the advantages in no uncertain 
terms. ''First. Two neighborhoods, unable to support a 
school separately, can, by uniting with each other, enjoy all 
the benefits of a common country school. ' ' 

''Second. One teacher can, on this plan accommodate 
two settlements at the same time ; and this is no small advan- 
tage when, good teachers are so few and far between. ' ' 

"Third. By reducing the cost of tuition nearly one-half, 
poor people who have large families can give them such an 
education as will fit them for occupying a respectable station 
in society." 

"Fourth. Those whose children are large enough to be 
of service to them either on the farm or in the house, can, on 
this plan, have them at home nearly half the time, employed 
in useful occupations, and acquiring steady and industrious 
habits, without which the health of the body, as well as the 
health of the mind, is destroyed.'"* 

Another picture of the teacher and the school, as well as 
the community, emphasized the lack of schools, the meager 
education provided, the insecurity of tenure and pay, and 
consequently, unqualified teachers. ' ' During the early history 
of Illinois, schools were almost unknown in some neighbor- 
hoods, and in the most favored districts, they were kept up 
solely by subscription, and only in the winter season, each 
subscriber agreeing to pay for one or more scholars, or stipu- 
lating to pay for his children pro rata for the number of days 
they should be in attendance. The teacher usually drew up 
articles of agreement, which stipulated that the school should 
commence when a specified number of scholars should be sub- 
scribed, at the rate of $2, $2.50, or $3 per scholar for the quar- 
ter. In these written articles, he bound himself to teach spell- 
ing, reading, writing, and arithmetic, as far as the double rule 
of three. Occasionally, a teacher would venture to include 
English grammar. But in the earlier years of my youth, I 
knew of no teacher who attempted to give instruction in 
grammar or geography. And such branches of history, nat- 
ural philosophy, or astronomy, were not thought of. Many 
parents were unwilling that their children should study arith- 
metic, contending that it was quite unnecessary for farmers, 

"State Supt. Rep., 1885-6, p. 114. 



118 

and what was the use of grammar to a person who could talk 
so as to be understood by everybody ? "^^ 

With scarce and inefficient schools, with little or no legal 
requirements for certification, and with no adequate pro- 
vision for the training of teachers, went low salaries. Some- 
times the teacher was to ''board round," or live with the 
patrons, in turn. Tuition for each pupil was charged, varying 
in amount from district to district, but it was used chiefly to 
pay the teacher. Once in a while, a widow was exempted 
from her share of the payment of the teacher's wages beyond 
her part of the common school fund. The law of 1825 made it 
legal for a teacher to receive produce instead of money.^^ 

Between 1844 and 1846, the highest wage for men ranged 
from $17 to $30 per month; the lowest, from $6 to $12, the 
average being about $15; the highest wage for women ranged 
from $9 to $17.56 per month, the lowest, from $3 to $6, the 
average being about $10.^^ No statement was made as to 
whether these wages were exclusive or inclusive of board and 
lodging. In some instances, it is known, when this calcula- 
tion was made by the ex-officio State Superintendent, that 
teachers paid their own board and lodging, in others, they 
did not. 

Illinois, at any rate, ranked among the highest states in 
the payment of teachers' salaries if the statistics of Horace 
Mann in the Prairie Farmer in 1848 were reliable : ' ' Salaries 
of teachers per month exclusive of board and room: 

Maine $15.40, males, $ 4.80, females 

New Hampshire 13.50, '' 5.65, 

Vermont 12.00, '' 4.75, 

New York 14.96, '' 6.69, 

Pennsylvania 17.02, '' 10.09, 

Ohio 15.42, " 8.73, 

Indiana 12.00, '' 6.00, 

Massachusetts 24.51, '* 8.07, 

In spite of the continuous reaffirmation, by political can- 
didates for office, of the value of common school education, 
the legislature passed few laws very far in advance of the 

"Patterson. Early Soc. in So. 111., in Fer. Hist. Ser.. No. 14. p. 121. 
" See Contract of Allen Parlier in Chap. VIII. 
" Senate and House Rep., 1846, p. 185. 
"Prairie Farmer, 1848, v. 8, p. 222. 



119 

general level of intelligence of the people in the State. How- 
ever, attention was focused on desirable laws though they 
were to be enacted in the future, by the indefatigable labor of 
the State Educational Association. The men of that body, at 
once and clearly, saw the necessity for trained teachers to 
conduct the schools. But the people were not to blame for 
failing to see the value of an entirely new educational doc- 
trine, new, even to the older states, when scarcely any system 
of common schools was in operation. The low salaries, the in- 
efficient teachers, and the inadequate schools, were partly the 
product of a frontier civilization, but also the result of the 
low educational conditions in the states from which they 
emigrated. 



J 20 



CHAPTER X. 



Some Agencies that Aided in the Development and the Estah- 
ment of the Common School. 

The common school system of Illinois, when the perma- 
nent free school law was passed, in 1855, was the product of 
more than a quarter of a century of development. In consid- 
ering farther the internal evolution of the system itself, let 
us examine the means by which the people of the State were 
taught to accept the principle that the State should educate 
its children. In general, democracy was just beginning to 
grow, and becoming conscious of its power. Humanitarian 
ideals, doing something for the other man's children, were for 
the first time, a national characteristic. Though the period 
from 1830 to 1865 was marked by many abuses in educational 
practice, the mass of the people were learning for the first 
time the advantages of a universal system of free common 
schools. Illinois had many agencies which contributed to the 
growth of that ideal. 

Usually, in a frontier communit}^ moral and educational 
values are first determined, by the championship of individual 
leaders. More settled life develops group leadership, not 
separate from, but existing along with prominent leaders, and 
institutions emerge with their own ends in view. Through the 
influence of educational leaders, the writings of newspapers 
and magazines, the work of institutions such as the Sunday 
schools and public libraries, and educational conventions, the 
development of the free school was hastened. Our next con- 
sideration, therefore, is a study of the part taken by these 
agencies. 

Educational Leaders. 

Governors of the State of Illinois, in the period we are 
considering, from first to last, took the lead in calling the at- 
tention of the general assembly to the necessity for, and the 
needs of the common schools. Governor Bond, the first in 



121 

office after the State was admitted into the Union, in 1818, 
recommended that township trustees lease the school lands, 
using the rent for educational purposes. Besides, a certain per 
centum of the sales of all public lands should be reserved for 
the use of schools, both of which incomes would be sufficiently 
large to educate the children of the state to the remotest per- 
iod of time. ^ 

We have described the activity of Governor Coles relative 
to the question of slavery and the free school law of 1825. 
With the many other recommendations to the legislature, Gov- 
ernor Coles spoke of the proper preservation of the public 
lands in the State as a means for the education of future gen- 
erations. "But, from the present super-abundance of lands, 
these will not be productive of much revenue for many years 
to come ; they should, however, be strictly husbanded as a rich 
source from which to supply fature generations with the 
means of education." (Now followed his suggestions which 
resulted in the free school law of 1825). "In the meantime, 
would it not be wise to make legal provision to assist in the 
support of local schools ? " ^ 

Whether or not Coles or Duncan wrote the law of 1825, 
both men were champions of the common schools. The latter, 
in following Coles as chief executive, continued to advise the 
legislature of the value of common schools, of the necessity 
for the adoption of some scheme of government support for 
education, and of the wisdom in preserving the now small fund 
for future use. "As every country is prosperous and re- 
spected in proportion to the virtue and intelligence of its 
inhabitants, the subject of education will doubtless again 
form an important part of your deliberations. It becomes us 
to use every exertion in our power to instruct those who are 
immediately dependent upon us, and least to those who come 
after us the rich revenues to be derived from land, canals, 
and other improvements ; to form a permanent fund to carry 
out any plan you may adopt for the purposes of education. 
A government like ours carried on by the will of the people, 
should be careful to use all the means in its power to en- 
lighten the minds of those who are destined to exercise so 
important a trust. This and every consideration connected 

1 Niles Weekly Register, v. 15, p. 192. 
^Sen. Jr.. 1824-5. p. 19. 



122 

with the virtue, elevation and happiness of man, and the char- 
acter and prosperity of our State, and of our common country 
calls upon you to establish some permanent system of com- 
mon schools by which an education may be placed within the 
power, nay, if possible secured to every child in the State." ' 

The governors above mentioned exemplified the part 
taken by the chief executives in support of education. "We 
shall speak in another connection of those who assisted the 
passage of the free school law of 1855. But no less influential 
in moulding the common schools of the national period w^ere 
the preachers, writers, lawyers and the professional classes 
generally. 

Were one to select the man whose efforts w^ere tlie great- 
est for the moral and educational uplift of the people, it 
would be Rev. J. M. Peck. The organization of the Rock 
Spring Seminary was but one of his manj^-sided activities. 
Sunday schools, through which the common children and 
many of the older people learned to read and write were first 
developed by this missionary preacher. Peck was found at 
every important gathering, legislative, agricultural, religious 
and educational, urging the creation of a system of schools 
for the common people. Through him, a public meeting, as- 
sembled in the state house at Vandalia to hear an address 
by Judge Hall on education, became the nucleus of the first 
state teachers' association. He was acquainted with the best 
in the New England schools, and knew how to impart that 
knowledge to others, either in his horseback rides over the 
State with backwoodsmen, or in legislative halls with gover- 
nors and political leaders. In him, the common man's chil- 
dren, as well as the children of the elite, had a lifelong friend. 
The passage of the first permanent free school law in the 
State was a fitting tribute to him, who had spent more than 
a quarter of a century for the cause of education In the State 
of Illinois. 

The New England and eastern settlers in Illinois were 
distinguished by their championship of the cause of free com- 
mon school education. Jonathan B. Turner, a teacher in 
Illinois College, spent the prime of his life, 1834-55, for the 
cause of the education of the common people, although he is 



"Sen. Jr., 1834-5. 



123 

better known for his service in the advocation of and the 
establishment of the University of Illinois. Conventions were 
organized, addresses were made, and letters and pamphlets 
were written by Turner, advocating the establishment of the 
common school by co-operation, and the nnity of the educa- 
tional forces of the State. A letter to his fiancee showed that 
he went about the State working for the common school: 

''Soon after writing my last, I determined to spend my 
vacation in looking into the state of common schools in Illi- 
nois. I have been absent about seven weeks, have passed 
through some dozen or fifteen counties and delivered public 
addresses in all the county seats and principal villages." 

''The result is that in all the counties I have visited, and 
many others to which I have written, they have resolved to 
call county meetings and elect delegates to the State Con- 
vention to be held at Vandalia next December to discuss the 
subject of common schools, and lay the subject before the 
people and Legislature. My success has been better than I 
expected, and I hope great good will result."* 

Another statement represented some of the things that 
Turner said in his addresses to the people on the subject of 
common schools: "While others are still contesting the 
boundaries of human freedom and adjusting the restraints 
of human depravity, we would give unlimited scope to the 
one by exterminating the other from the face of the earth. 
With these ends in view, it devolves on us to augment the 
facilities, the resources and the completion of knowledge, until 
a royal road shall be paved from the threshold of every cabin 
in the land to the open doors and waiting honors of our most 
magnificent temples of science. If by council, concert, and co- 
operation, we concentrate our energies and husband our re- 
sources to the utmost, who can over-estimate the final result? 
But if we fling the experience of the past and the advantages 
of the present to the winds, and each for himself resolves in 
his own solitary career of experiment and effort, — beleaguer- 
ing and jading the public mind, and exhausting the public 
resources with our own isolated and selfish schemes — what a 
fearful retribution awaits both of us and those who are to 
come after us." ° 



* Life of Jonathan Baldwin Turner, p. 70. 
•Ibid. p. 72. 



124 

The whole group of Illinois College men and their as- 
sociates — Edward Beecher, Julian M. Sturtevant, Truman 
M. Post, Theron Baldwin, William Kirby, Samuel Adams, 
Elisha Jenney, Asa Turner, John F. Brooks, Samuel D. Lock- 
wood, J. M. Ellis, Albert Hale and William Brown — were de- 
voted advocates of the common school. The welfare of the 
State and the happiness of the people depended not only on 
the advancement of education, but these men also saw that 
the cause of higher learning was destined to be founded on a 
common public school system. 

Notices of the work done in the advancement of educa- 
tion by some of these men appeared in the newspapers of that 
day: ''At the commencement in Jacksonville, Aug. 21, 1833, 
an address on Common Schools, by Eev. Theron Baldwin." 
''Thursday evening, Nov. 13, 1834, an address in Springfield 
by Prof. J. B. Turner, Subject: Common Schools." "Lec- 
ture on Education by Rev. Mr. Baldwin at Mt. Carmel, 
Wabash County, August, 1836." "A lecture by Prof. Stur- 
tevant in Springfield, 1843, in behalf of a State Superintend-' 
ent. Lecture repeated before the legislature the next night." 
"The annual commencement of Jacksonville College Sept. 21, 
1836. N. B. — A convention of teachers will be held on the 
afternoon of the preceding day to concert measures for the 
cause of education in this state. "^ 

Judge Hall, the foremost literary writer of the State up 
to the time of his removal to Cincinnati, in 1833, advocated 
public education in his addresses and writings. Theron 
Baldwin, with other Illinois College men, took up the cause 
of education in their editorship of the Common School Advo- 
cate. John S. Wright of Chicago, built a common school in 
1835 in Chicago, at his own expense; edited the Prairie 
Farmer, a journal devoted to agriculture, mechanic arts, and 
common schools, and took an active part in the creation of 
educational laws. Charles E. Hovey, the first editor of the 
Illinois Teacher, the president of the State Teachers' As- 
sociation, principal of the public schools of Peoria, and head 
of the Normal School established in 1857, performed a dis- 
tinguished service in organizing and uniting the teachers of 
the State in the cause of free public schools. 



« State Supt. Report, 1885-6, p. 128. 



125 ' 

Besides the editors just mentioned, the missionary cir- 
cuit riders and state religious agents seldom failed to lend 
their influence for the enlightenment of the children of the 
State. Lemuel Foster, appointed in 1832 as a missionary to 
Illinois, built an academy in Jacksonville and one in Bloom- 
ington where common, as well as academic instruction was 
given ; established Sunday schools in the surrounding country 
and interviewed his constituents for the purpose of gaining 
their support for public instruction. John F. Brooks, sent 
to St. Clair county, opened one of the first teachers' semi- 
naries in Waverley, in 1837, directed the Springfield Academy 
in 1840, and acted as principal of the public schools in the 
same city. Other typical religious leaders were Romulus 
Barnes, Flavel Bascom, Aratus Kent, Peter Cartwright and 
Hubbel Loomis. 

The work of the state superintendents and legislators in 
securing laws for the organization of free schools should not 
be overlooked. Mr. Gatewood was named in the last chapter 
and an extract of his address was given to show what he, as 
chairman of the Senate Educational Committee, thought were 
the reasons for developing common schools. S. W. Moulton, 
to whom the free school bill was entrusted, in the legislature 
in 1854, spent several years after the passage of the law in 
writing articles and giving addresses on the justification of 
taxation for the support of schools, and the manner in which 
the distribution of revenue for school purposes should take 
place. N. W. Edwards spent much time in gathering statis- 
tics to show the condition of the schools of the State. As 
superintendent, he \dsited every county and gave addresses 
urging the creation of free schools. Moreover, the legislature 
required that he prepare a bill for the reorganization of the 
entire school system. A state agent was appointed by the 
State Teachers' Association to travel over the State in the 
interest of free schools. His first report indicated the nature 
of his work : 

He visited twenty-one schools and delivered sixteen eve- 
ning addresses the first month. *'At Hennepin, I found a new 
and beautiful edifice, erected at a cost of seven thousand dol- 
lars, for a private school, and labored, not without hope of 
success, to induce the people to obtain it and establish therein 



126 

a graded free school. At Kewanee, it was attempted to show 
that the true interests of Wethersfield and Kewanee, adja- 
cent districts, w^ould be promoted by purchasing the semi- 
nary building located midway between them, and organizing 
in it a Central High School. The stock-holders proposed to 
give the six thousand dollars already expended, if the two 
districts would assume the indebtedness — two thousand dol- 
lars. The proposition was well received, and has since been 
adopted. They will soon rejoice in the possession of a first 
class High School, free to all whose attainments entitle them 
to admission." ^ 

Men of national prominence in other states were also in- 
fluential in the development of the school system of Illinois. 
The ideas of Jefferson were foremost in the law of 1825. De- 
Witt Clinton was a leader, in the state of New York, in crea- 
ting a common school system. But his addresses appeared in 
the Illinois papers, of which the following is a typical extract : 
i i rpj^e great bulwark of a republican government, is the culti- 
vation of education; for the right of suffrage cannot be ex- 
ercised in a salutary manner without intelligence. Ten years 
of a child's life, from five to fifteen, may be spent in a common 
school, and ought this immense portion of time to be absorbed 
in learning what can be acquired in a short period? Perhaps 
one-fourth of our population is annually instructed in our 
common schools, and ought the minds and the morals of the 
rising, and perhaps the destinies of all future generations, 
to be entrusted to the guardianship of incompetence? The 
scale of instruction must be elevated ; the standard of educa- 
tion ought to be raised. Small and suitable collections of 
books and maps attached to our common schools, and periodi- 
cal examinations to test the proficiency of scholars, and the 
merits of the teachers, are worthy of attention. When it is 
understood that objects of this description enter into the for- 
mation of our characters, control our destinies through life, 
protect the freedom and advance the glory of our country; 
and that this is the appropriate soil of liberty and education, 
that it be our pride, as it is our duty to spare no exertions, 
and to shrink from no expense, in the promotion of a cause 
consecrated by religion, and enjoined by patriotism." * 

Till. Teach.. V. 5. p. 90. 
•Sang. Jr., Jan. 10, 1835. 



127 

Horace Mann's and Henry Barnard's reports dealing 
with the organization and establishment of a common school 
system, also were quoted in Illinois publications. Moreover, 
Mr. Barnard was on the program at two different common 
school conventions where he discussed the internal features 
of free schools.® 

Any classification of some of the representative leaders 
is impossible because their interests were so many sided. An 
Hlinois College founder like Baldwin was a missionary, who 
established Sunday schools, a preacher who advocated the 
cause of education before the legislature, and the principal of 
Monticello Seminary wherein some teachers were trained for 
the common schools. Moreover, he was an editor of one of the 
literary agencies for the promotion of education in the West. 

Literary Agencies. 

Only a little of the literary material of the period to 1850 
has been preserved. In that which has survived, the subject 
of education continually appears. Many of the newspapers 
spread information about the schools of the State, inserted 
addresses from men like Governor Clinton, Horace Mann and 
Henry Barnard on education, summarized the reports of state 
superintendents of public instruction in such states as New 
York and Connecticut, and recommended the adoption of cer- 
tain principles for the improvement of education in Illinois. 
As the creators of public opinion, and the means by which the 
knowledge of school practices was disseminated, many of the 
newspapers were preeminent. 

The ideas attributed to Judge Hall, the first newspaper 
editor in the State, have come from the volumes of the Illinois 
Monthly Magazine, published at Vandalia, 1827 to 1830. That 
publication might well be called the first school journal of the 
State. Among other articles were those on the need for scien- 
tific instruction as opposed to an all-language curriculum: 
arguments for the creation of a state system of free common 
education; recommendations for the use of new and better 
text-books, and surveys of the educational means in existence. 
This magazine was too far in advance of the literary ability 
of the people on the frontier; hence it was necessary for the 
editor to remove to Cincinnati in the early thirties where the 
publication was continued. 

•state Supt. Rep., 1885-6, p. 152. 



128 

However, in 1837, appeared the Common School Advo- 
cate, a monthly journal, printed at Jacksonville. A group of 
editors, probably Illinois College teachers, carried on the 
publication for a year without pay. Even the short existence 
of the paper, only twelve months, advanced the common school 
cause. The contents of the Advocate are indicated by the 
first editorial suggesting topics for contribution. 

"Objects of education — different grades of it, and the 
kind adapted to this age. Teaching made a j^rofession — 
benefits of it. Best method of teaching geography, arithmetic, 
grammar, reading, writing, etc. Common schools — their im- 
portance, etc. Necessity of well qualified teachers. Teach- 
ers' seminaries. Government and discipline of a school. 
School books. Common school libraries and apparatus. 
Duties of parents, teachers and trustees. Location and struc- 
ture of school houses. Systems of education in our own and 
other countries. Importance of universal education under 
free governments. Accounts of educational associations and 
conventions, or of particular schools. Facts respecting the 
state of education, particularly in Illinois. The system best 
adapted to our circumstances. Moral and religious education 
in schools. Connection between ignorance and crime — be- 
tween intelligence and national prosperity. ' ""^ 

But the most influential school journal, until the appear- 
ance of the Illinois Teacher, in 1854, was the Prairie Farmer, 
issued as the Union Agriculturist from 1841 to 1843. The title 
page, among other things, said it was a journal dedicated to 
the cause of the common schools in Illinois. Without its 
record, the story of the struggle for free education in the 
period from 1841 to 1854, would be almost impossible of re- 
production. Such articles as these were discussed in its 
pages: the need for a normal school; the necessity for trained 
teachers; the criminal negligence in not providing decent 
common school buildings ; reports of the ex-officio state super- 
intendent of common schools; proceedings of educational con- 
ventions, both state and county; arguments against select 
schools and private academies; the reasons for free schools; 
the subjects taught in the free schools; reports of the New 
England and New York common schools; advantages of a 
State superintendent; gradation as a means of improvement 

"State Supt. Report, 1885-6. p. 133. 



129 

in the educational system; desirable school legislation, and 
school statistics. 

The cause of the farmer was the cause of the common: 
school. The readers of the Prairie Farmer, besides learning, 
about agriculture and mechanic arts, were being educated in 
the cause of free schools, so that the passage and adoption of 
the free school law of 1855 was possible. Moreover, this 
journal had the unique distinction and advantage of reaching 
the patrons of the schools rather than being a journal read by 
the teachers only. 

Last, but by no means least, was the Illinois Teacher, 
founded in the interests of education, in 1854. Established 
about a year before the passage of the first permanent free 
school law, this journal became a means, primarily, of helping 
develop the free schools. Methods of teaching the subjects in. 
the curriculum were discussed in each number from year tO' 
year. Educational news in the way of promotions, increases 
in salary, and the employment and marriage of teachers ap- 
peared. The proceedings of educational conventions; digests • 
of school law; controversies over which section of the State 
was more enlightened — ''Egypt," or the North; reasons for 
gradation with the explanation of its meaning; reports from 
the State agent travelling in the interests of the establishment 
of free schools; notices of the creation of high schools and 
suggested curricula for them were a few of the many subjects- 
treated. 

The teachers, especially, were made conscious of many of 
the problems raised by the beginning of free schools. Also, 
were the teachers benefited by the experiences of others 
through the medium of the first relatively permanent profes- 
sional journal. The support of the Illinois Teacher by the 
profession itself signified, for the first time, a unity of action 
and a group consciousness of the teachers themselves. With 
that power back of the free schools, progress became possible. 

Institutions Whose Objects Indirectly Aided Common School 

Education. 
Prominent among the organizations for the aid of the 
common schools, was the Ladies' Association for the Educa- 
tion of Females, established at Jacksonville, Oct. 4. 1833, ''the 
principal object of which shall be to encourage and assist 



130 

young ladies to qualify themselves for teaching, and aid in 
supporting teachers in those places where they cannot other- 
wise be sustained. "^^ 

"The plan was liberal and simple. The principle object 
was to educate teachers, but no pledges were exacted; no at- 
tempt to decide where or how the individual could be most 
useful. The great object was to instruct and elevate the hu- 
man mind for its own sake, and in the belief that a mind right- 
ly educated will not fail to enlighten others "^^ 

The fifth annual report of this association advertised 
schools where prospective teachers could receive training. 
Such were in Fulton, Morgan, Greene, Madison, Macoupin, 
Bond, Pike, Putnam, Knox, McLean and LaSalle counties. 
Moreover, auxiliary associations had been formed in Chicago, 
Ottawa, Farmington, Peoria, Springfield, Alton, Upper Alton, 
Rushville, Carlinville, Galena, Griggsville, Quincy, Fairfield, 
Hadley, Warsaw, Carlyle, Augusta, Knoxville, Bloomington, 
Jacksonville, Carrollton, Manchester, Canton, Waverly, Win- 
chester, Jerseyville, Beardsto\\ai, and Joliet.^" 

The power of the association is seen in that twelve hun- 
dred young women were assisted in receiving an education, 
many of whom became teachers in the common schools, with 
$25,091.35 expended for that purpose. The Illinois Teacher 
described the work, purposes and aims of the organization 
thus: ''With none of the pomp and e'clat which herald the 
movements of other institutions, it has gone steadily on in its 
benign mission" * * * educating young ladies, "who 
else must have been forever denied the blessings of liberal 
culture, have been sent forth to be angels of mercy and joy to 
many hearts and homes, in this and other lands. This is not 
the language of mere eulogy ; we have watched the progress of 
this society from its foundation; we know the ladies who are 
and have been its officers and friends; we know its struggles 
and labors, and we know its fruits. We cannot better express 
our opinion of its history and character than in the touching 
and eloquent words of one of its founders : ' ' 

"Silent, catholic, economical and persevering; it has been 
so Christ-like in its labors that the world has never known 
and could not stop to read its history. Its anniversaries have 

" 5th An. Rep Lad. Assoc. 
" 5th An. Rep Lad. Assoc. 



131 

been simple exponents of an institution partaking so little of 
the spirit of the world. No noise, or parade, but a plain state- 
ment of its labor, expenditures, and successes. Its history is 
written in the heart of many a missionary, toiling in obscure 
indigence; it is written, too, in the heart of the orphan and 
the poor, who by timely aid have been able to break the fet- 
ters by which poverty held back their aspirations for knowl- 
edge; it will be read in the ages to come, in the light of 

heaven." ^^ . i r? 

This association mainly educated poor girls, many ot 
whom found their way as teachers into the common schools. 
A better class of teachers was thus provided than would have 
been without the work of this association. 

Workingmen's organizations, in the absence of common 
schools, provided education for the youth of their districts. 
Even the Mechanics' Union of Springfield advertised that its 
school was the free public school of the city. These asso- 
ciations helped focus the attention of the people on the need 
for, and the absence of, a free school system. Newspapers 
commented upon the worthy purposes of the workmen, and 
advertised, in the news sections of the paper, the rates of 
tuition, the curricula and the objects. One association stated 
its aims in these words : 

"The Springfield Mechanics' Union is established for the 
creation of a common school, and a public libraiy, and for the 
promotion of literature, science, and the mechanic arts;'"* 
Other purposes were stated but they are not related to the 
subject of education. Similarly, the Mechanics' Union of 
Chicago said that its object was to diffuse knowledge and in- 
formation throughout the mechanic classes, to found lec- 
tures on natural, mechanical and chemical philosophy, and 
other scientific subjects ; to create a library and a museum for 
the benefit of others, and to establish schools for the benefit of 
their children. 

The movement for the education of the children of the 
working men was general in the period from 1830 to 1865. 
Common schools were established in the principal cities 
throughout the East and the middle West. Many of the Me- 
chanics In stitutes in the older cities today, owe their origin to 

"111. Teach., v. 4, p. 286. 
" Sess. Laws, 1839-40, p. 74. 



132 

this period in which labor organizations established schools 
in the absence of a free common school system. Through that 
experience, the public was gradually learning the value of, 
and how free schools should be established. 

General education, by whatever means, had a decisive in- 
fluence in making it possible for the creation of universal free 
education. The emancipation of the mind of men and women 
from ignorance gave them the taste for the education that 
ought to be provided for their children. Another means, 
therefore, by which older people were educated was the public 
library. These, indeed, assisted the establishment of a com- 
mon school system by showing the merits of education. 

Public libraries were formed as joint stock companies in 
several towns. The county commissioners' record of Edwards 
county, 1815 to 1832, had the names of twelve stockholders 
who subscribed 97 of the 300 shares for the creation of a 
public library; whereupon the contract was let to John Robin- 
son for the erection of a library building to cost $1,800. 

This building was used for public meetings, a house of 
worship and a library. "A good market house, and a public 
library is at the end, in which a kind of Unitarian worship is 
held on Sunday, when a sermon and church service, purified, 
is read by any one who pleases. The books are donations 
from the Flower family, and their friends in England.'"' 
''They have a library, and much attention appears to be paid 
to the cultivation of the mind as well as the soil. ' '^^ 

Edwardsville made a similarly early start in the founda- 
tion of a library by buying books from Boston. ''It will, no 
doubt, be gratifying to the proprietors of this institution to 
know that the books lately ordered from Boston have arrived. 
Those subscribers, who are in arrears, it is hoped, will come 
forward and by paying up, entitle themselves and others to 
use one of the best collections of books in the country. "^^ The 
catalogue of books, which were considered the masterpieces 
of literature, appeared in the same issue of the Spectator as 
the above quotation. 

The session laws have several of the articles of incor- 
poration of public library associations in them. Other un- 

'=Faux Jr., p. 253, Thwaites. v. 1. 
"Niles Reg., v. 19. p. 368. 
"Spec, Aug. 7, 1819. 



133 

incorporated organizations were also formed, both of which 
served as a means of public enlightenment. Usually, the 
membership fee was low enough for all to join, perhaps one 
dollar a year, and the people were requested to make use of 
the books. 

''The trustees of the Warsaw Library Association take 
pleasure in informing the stocldiolders of the institution 
that they have procured the railroad office for their use, and 
that they are fitting up in connection with it a Reading Eoom, 
which will be open in a few days, well supplied with news- 
papers. The room will be open each day (Sunday. excepted) 
after the hour of five o'clock, P. M., at which time stock- 
holders wishing to receive or exchange books, mil be waited 
upon by the librarian for that purpose. Ladies and gentle- 
men of the village, and strangers sojourning among us, are 
respectfully invited to use it." '® 

A second means of promoting the general intelligence 
were the academies. More direct connection between the 
semi-public seminaries and the common schools existed than 
at first might be suspected. The principals and teachers of 
many of the former institutions were leaders in the educa- 
tional thought of the State. Those men and women held their 
positions because of their ability, and the trust placed in them 
by the public. Active in the councils of the state, and county 
associations, those men took every occasion to promote free 
education. Indeed, they appeared before the general as- 
sembly in the interests of the common schools, as well as in 
the interests of the academies. Finally, they were intelligent 
and generous enough to believe that the hope of higher learn- 
ing lay in the creation of a free school system. 

Moreover, both public and private academies provided 
much of the common school education of the time. In the 
charters of the former, a stipulation usually was made which 
required or provided that the academies conduct common 
schools. _ The following quotation is an example of the re- 
lationship between the academy and the common school: 
*'Sec. 9. There shall also be attached to the said academy, 
a department in which shall be taught branches that are 
usually taught in the common schools of the district in which 

"Warsaw Sigrnal, May 26, 1841. 



134 

said academy may be situated ; and the said trustees of said 
academy, shall receive from the school commissioner of the 
county, the same amount of money in the same proportion, 
and apply the same to such tuition in the same manner as 
other common schools are paid and kept ; Provided, that the 
teachers or instructors, of said department shall be selected 
by the trustees and under the control of the by-laws of said 
corporation. ' ' ^^ 

But the share of the common school fund that the acad- 
emies received for maintaining a common school was not suf- 
ficient to pay the expenses of a very long term. The result 
was that the academies charged their common school pupils 
tuition at a little lower rate than was received for the higher 
branches, or reduced the tuition of all subjects by the amount 
that they expected to receive from the school fund, or kept 
the rate of tuition as high as possible, even when they re- 
ceived their share of public money, because there was no 
authority that required a standard rate of tuition. 

Nevertheless, the proposed school bill of 1835 was an 
attempt by which one academy in each county of the State 
should be so regulated and supported as to be a direct benefit 
to the common school. Tuition for the graduates of the acad- 
emy who were to be teachers in the common school, was to 
be paid by the State. At any rate, the academy and the com- 
mon school were brought into a closer relation by some of the 
students of the former becoming teachers in the latter. The 
two institutions were again brought together, for the pur- 
pose of advancing the interests of the common schools, in the 
series of educational conventions that were held between 
1833 and 1855. Before discussing the conventions, however, 
a study of the work of the Sunday -schools follows : 

The Sunday school was very prominent in raising the 
level of general intelligence throughout the State. It had its 
origin in Europe, in the Wesleyan revival, beginning in 1738, 
and the humanitarian philosophy that just preceded the 
French Revolution. In England, the purpose was primarily 
concerned with the education of poor children, but independ- 
ent of the church. On the other hand, in the United States, 
the first Sunday school, organized at Philadelphia in 1791, 

» Sess. Laws, 1841, p. 7. 



135 

was established for the purpose of giving secular and relig- 
ious instruction. It was the accepted province of the church 
to give religious education, and the connection between the 
common school and the church had been so close that the 
Sunday school developed as a church institution. On the 
secular side, the Sunday school provided rudimentary educa- 
tion for the lower classes in the older states, while all classes 
in the frontier western communities received the benefits of 
that well organized body. 

After 1831, the Massachusetts Sunday School Union be- 
came a parent of smaller organizations in Illinois, while the 
Illinois State Sunday School Union, composed of members of 
the principal religious denominations in the State, organized 
branches in nearly every county and smaller auxiliary 
branches, both, through the help of state agents, intelligent 
and devoted citizens, resident clergy and circuit missionaries. 

Eev. Theron Baldwin gave this account as an example of 
his work in establishing Sunday schools: 

''The Sabbath School, — to establish which was among my 
first efforts here, commenced about the first of February with 
a good degree of interest * * * It numbers a little more 
than one-hundred. The library books have been read, and 
these in connection mth the exercises of the school have evi- 
dently done much already towards creating a thirst for 
laiowledge on the part of the scholars. Of the one-hundred 
five who have entered the school, only thirty-seven could read. 
I have made particular efforts in the Sabbath School, from a 
firm conviction that the minister of Christ can spend a part 
of his energies, at least, in no other wav to so great advan- 
tage. "^° 

The following is an account of how Sunday schools were 
established: '*It is often difficult to start a Sabbath school, 
there is so much ignorant prejudice and opposition. I have 
a way wiiich does well, when many good efforts of another 
sort are lost. In my visiting about, I look out some house in 
the settlement where I intend to form a school, — and one can 
generally be obtained in one way or another — and then with- 
out giving a word of notice, for that would awaken and com- 
bine opposition, I fill my saddle-bags with books begging 

»*Home Miss., v. 2, p. 59. 



13(J 

what I can, buying what I cannot beg, (for it is against the 
rules of the S. S. Union to give books before a school is 
formed) get on my horse and ride around with them to each 
family in the settlement, talk over with them the whole matter 
of the Sabbath School, and its benefits, persuading the 
parents, showing my books and interesting the children, 
giving to each, on the condition of their attending school, such 
a book as would be needed in it, at the same time telling them 
where and when we would begin to meet. In this way, the 
careless and prejudiced, who would not stir a step to hear 
ever so many addresses on Sabbath Schools, become deeply 
interested." '^ 

Sunday schools w^ere established as early, at least ^s 
1821, for the settlers of Lebanon formed themselves into 
a society and built a house where a seminary, library, a de- 
bating club and a Sunday school were conducted. About a 
decade later the records show how extensively the system was 
established in every section. Peck estimated that 375 Sunday 
schools with 2000 teachers, 17,000 pupils and 2000 volumes in 
their libraries, were in existence in Illinois. " 

Usually, two sessions were held on Sunday, in the morn- 
ing and in the afternoon, w^here reading, writing and some 
very simple arithmetic were taught. The Bible, religious 
hjTQns and religious tracts were the principal texts. The 
youth, and occasionally their elders, were taught by the best 
educated men and women of the district and the local or cir- 
cuit preacher opened or closed each session with an address 
to all. 

These institutions made communities in several districts 
realize their educational deprivation which surrounded them 
with the result that in some instances, the Sunday school was 
continued as a permanent week-day school. Thus the in- 
habitants of Rushville first founded schools on Sunday, and 
then, ''formed themselves into a School Association, for the 
purpose of keeping in operation a permanent school, to be 
taught by a competent instructor; of good moral and tem- 
porate habits." ^^ 



"Home Miss., vol. 2, p. 59. 

"Peck, Gaz., p. 89. 

2^ Home Miss., v. 2, p. 194. 



137 

In considering the literary agencies in Illinois, Judge 
Hall characterized the value of the Sunday schools in this 
manner: ''We view these efforts with unmingled pleasure. 
Apart from the important religious bearing of the Sunday 
School svstem, we consider it the most powerful engine, that 
this creative age has produced, for diffusion of knowledge. Its 
adaptation to'the wants of a new country is peculiar. It 
brings instruction within the reach of thousands who have not 
the 'means of procuring it through ordinary channels; dis- 
seminates education free of expense; scatters books far and 
wide over the country; creates a taste for reading, and habits 
of inquiry among the young; and by its social character exer- 
cises a most happy effect, in promoting kind feelings, and 
cordial intercourse in society.""* 

Educational Conventions. 

The Vandalia conventions of 1833 and 1834 have been 
sufficiently discussed in the last chapter. However, those 
meetings were the first of a large number in the State and 
counties, to 1855. They created enthusiasm for the common 
schools; they brought the leaders and friends of education 
together, and made harmonious and concentrated effort 
possible. 

The constitution of the Illinois State Education Society, 
organized at Springfield, Dec. 28, 1840, was an illustration 
of the purpose for which teachers' associations were 
founded: "The friends of education assembled in Spring- 
field, believing that the perpetuity of our free institutions, 
and our political, social and moral well being, depend mainly 
on the general diffusion of knowledge among people ; and that 
the wants of our rapidly increasing population strongly de- 
mands such an improvement in our common school system 
as will place the benefits of education within the reach of 
every citizen. * * * Its object shall be to promote, by all 
laudable means, the diffusion of knowledge in regard to edu- 
cation; and, especially, to endeavor to render the system of 
common schools throughout the State as perfect as possi- 
ble."^' 



«I11. Mo. Magr., V. 2. D. 103. 
"Sate Supt. Rep., 1885-6, p. 136. 



138 

Prom 1841 to the constitutional convention of 1847, much 
material was published on the creation of a State Superin- 
tendent of common schools. Petitions were circulated at the 
instance of educational associations, while editors of news- 
papers and journals urged their readers to sign. As a sample 
of the memorials sent to the legislature by teachers ' organiza- 
tions asking for the establishment of a superintendent of 
common schools, let us examine the one sent in 1841. 

''Let a superintendent of common schools be appointed — 
a man of talents, and yet a laborious and self-denying man; 
one who would go into all the dark corners, as well as the 
bright spots of the State, and labor day in and day out for the 
improvement of our common schools. Such a man would be 
a great use, not only in awakening the public to the import- 
ance of education, but by collecting facts for the information 
of your honorable body and the people. He would associate 
with all classes of the community, from the cabin to the man- 
sion — from the humble teacher of the humblest school to the 
most learned professor — and advise you of their feelings 
and views. He would note the practical operation of the 
system, and suggest for your consideration wherein it might 
be improved. He would (a matter of no mean moment to the 
success of the common school education) do much towards 
bringing about a steady and uniform administration of the 
law. 

''Your memorialists would also suggest that, as a matter 
of economy, a man of established virtue — of much experi- 
ence ; one w^ho is familiar with the habits and feelings of our 
people; a man whose mind is well disciplined — should be 
placed at the head of this department. The interests involved 
are so various, so momentous, that the best mind in the State 
should be set to watch over tliem. Should the right sort of a 
man be selected and paid out of the general school fund, he 
will save to the general and to^\Tiship funds, by looking after 
their interests (aside from all other benefits resulting from 
his labors), a sum at least equal to his salary. 

"Your memorialists would also suggest, that if any re- 
gard is due to the experience and example of other states, 
who have found a superintendent necessary to the success of 
their efforts in behalf of common school education, you are 



139 

strongly urged thereby to appoint a superintendent of the 
State of Illinois." =^« 

The legislature, however, passed no law creating the 
superintendent of common schools. But the Peoria convention 
of 1844 took up the question again with the result that the 
Secretary of State was made ex-ofificio state superintendent 
of common schools. 

A whole reorganization of the school system was de- 
manded from the legislature by the Peoria meeting. Discus- 
sions and reports were made on the subjects of a board of 
education; a board of county superintendents; district trus- 
tees; school districts; town superintendents; the school fund; 
gradation, and taxation. 

On the last point, the memorialists argued at great length 
to overcome the hostility of the legislature and the people 
they represented, to taxation. Even if schools should be 
supported by taxation, the State was deeply in debt and times 
were hard because the effects of the panic of 1837 had not 
passed. But the objection to a tax for the education of other 
people's children was natural. The following paragraphs 
illustrated the attitude of the Peoria convention: 

"We come now to consider finally, the one great requisite 
of the proposed plan— taxation. Each of the other parts is 
considered essential, yet they are but the machinery to work 
this result. We come out frankly and boldly, and acknow- 
ledge the whole system, every effort is intended only as a 
means of allurement to draw the people into the grasp of this 
most awful monster — a school tax." 

''But start not back in alarm. After all he may not be 
so terrible as some have perhaps imagined. Used with skill 
and judgment, and no other power can accomplish what he 
will; no other can work such changes in your common schools, 
and it is in vain that we attempt to dispense with his services. 
All experience throughout the Union is in favor of his em- 
ployment. We do not, however, propose coercing any to 
employ him, who prefer to let him alone. All _ we ask is to 
give those permission to use him who are so inclined; and 
others when they witness his subordination, and power to 

"State Supt. Rep., 1885-6, p. 136. 



140 

work for the cause of education, will doubtless desire them- 
selves to try his services" 

'Our position is that taxation for the support of schools 
is wise and just, that it is in fact the only method by which 
the deficiency for defraying the expenses of popular educa- 
tion beyond that supplied by the public funds can be equalized 
amongst those who should pay it." 

The schools of the State, by the law of 1845, were per- 
mitted to receive a tax for their support provided it was 
levied by a vote of two-thirds majority in any district. The 
amount of tax, however, that could be levied in any way was 
not to exceed fifteen cents on the one hundred dollars. 

Four agencies by which the common school was aided in 
its development, and in its establishment as a free public in- 
stitution have been discussed. (1) Prominent educational lead- 
ers were: most of the governors, who were nobly assisted by 
the untiring labors of Peck; the Illinois College men; such 
editors as Judge Hall, John S. Wright, Charles E. Hovey ; the 
missionary circuit riders and resident ministers; state super- 
intendents; legislators; state agents; and a few nationally 
prominent men of other states in the persons of Jefferson, 
Clinton, Mann and Barnard. (2) Many of the newspapers of 
the State, the Illinois Monthly Magazine, the Common School 
Advocate, the Prairie Farmer, and the Illinois Teacher were 
the literary means devoted to the interests of the common 
schools. (3) Institutions that increased the general intelligence 
of the people and created a desire for better educational op- 
portunities were, the Ladies' Aid Association for the Educa- 
tion of Females; workingmen's organizations, public libraries, 
Sunday schools and academies. (4) Enthusiasm, harmony, 
and cooperation among the friends of the common school in 
the cause of general enlightenment, were developed by educa- 
tional conventions. An ex-officio state superintendent of com- 
mon schools was created in the person of the Secretary of 
State upon the recommendation of the Peoria Convention, 
But the legislature only conceded the right to levy taxes for 
the support of schools when a two-thirds majority of the peo- 
ple of any district so decided. The next chapter shall show 
how the common schools were made free, and shall indicate 
what the attitude was toward them. 



141 



CHAPTER XI. 



The Free School Laiv of 1855. 

The friends of education were not satisfied with halfway 
measures. If districts were allowed to decide whether a tax 
should be voted for the support of schools, there would be few 
free schools. As a result, agitation was continued by educa- 
tional associations for the appointment of a state superin- 
tendent of common schools, separate from the Secretary of 
State, and a compulsory ad valorem property tax. Accord- 
ingly, the Chicago school convention in 1846, resolved, among 
other things, to make a survey of the State in order to de- 
termine the qualifications of teachers in the service of com- 
mon schools, the condition of schoolhouses, what amount of 
money was raised in each district for the support of schools, 
what was the attitude of the people toward general property 
tax, and what sum was paid for tuition by subscription.^ 

The Springfield Teachers' Association in the same year 
took a little different course. They resolved ''that a commit- 
tee of five be appointed to report to the convention a plan for 
the organization of a State Education Society."^ That so- 
ciety was immediately organized, and began to create aux- 
iliaries in the counties of the State for the purpose of aiding 
common schools. 

The discussions by members of all the conventions, since 
the first in 1833, had finally awakened the public to the need 
of a more adequate school system. The people had seen the 
necessity for the revision of the state constitution and had as- 
sembled in a constitutional convention in Springfield in 1847. 
The fundamental law of the State ought to recognize the all- 
important subject of a system of education. Accordingly, 
the convention appointed a large -representative committee 



'Prairie Farmer, v. 6, p. 351. 
»Ibid.. V. 7, p. 73. 



142 

to consider the subject. To them, petitions were pouring in, 
chiefly from the newer counties of the North and West, settled 
by Easterners. Represented in the list, were Livingston, 
Madison, Cass, DuPage, DeKalb, McLean, Knox, Fulton, 
Peoria, Mason, Brown, Winnebago, Carroll, Crawford, Rock 
Island, Marshall, Whiteside, Stephenson, Pike, McHenry, 
St. Clair, and Sangamon counties. 

It was but natural, therefore, that a resolution was intro- 
duced in the constitutional convention for the creation of a 
state superintendent of common schools: ''Believing that 
important measures are necessary to advance the cause of 
education, the basis of our republican form of government, 
and to elevate the moral standard of common schools, the 
only source from which most of our youth derive their educa- 
tion ; therefore. Resolved, That an article be ingrafted into our 
state constitution creating the office of state superintendent 
of common schools, who shall be elected by the people and 
hold his office for the term of four years, and until his suc- 
cessor is elected and qualified, and receive the salary of $ 

whose duty it shall be to have the general superintendence of 
common schools in this state, and report the conditions of 
the same in a manner and as often as may be required by 
law."^ 

Next, a resolution was passed by the convention which 
provided for the support of schools by taxation and a super- 
intendent to make the system effective : ' ' Resolved, That the 
committee on education be instructed to consider and report 
as to the propriety of a constitutional provision for the 
security of the college, seminary, and common school funds 
from conversion or destruction by the legislature. Also, for 
the establishment of a system of common schools as well, by 
taxation combined with state funds, afford the means of edu- 
cation to every child in the state, and the appointment of a 
state superintendent, with an adequate salary, to give effect 
to such system. ' ' * 

Whereupon, the educational committee of the constitu- 
tional convention introduced a bill, which passed the first 
reading, and which should become a part of the organic law 
of the State. By this, the legislature should create a free, uni- 

8 Jr. Const. Conv.. p. 31. 
<Ibld., p. 78. 



143 

versal system of common schools, at the head of which should 
be a state superintendent, appointed by the governor for a 
term of two years. 

''Sec. 3. It shall be the duty of the General Assembly 
to provide for a system of common schools, which shall be as 
nearly uniform as may be throu.^'hout the State, and such 
common schools shall be equally free to all the children in the 
State, and no sectarian instruction shall be permitted in any 
of them." ^ 

"Sec. 4. The superintendency of public instruction in 
this State shall be vested in an officer to be styled 'the super- 
intendent of common schools,' and such county and local 
superintendents as may be established by law. ' ' "^ 

"Sec. 5. At the first session of the General Assembly 
after the adoption of this constitution and biennially there- 
after, it shall be the duty of the governor, by and with the 
advice and consent of the senate (a majority of all members 
elected thereto concurring therein), to appoint a superin- 
tendent of common schools, who shall hold his office for the 
term of two years and shall perform such duties and receive 
such salary as the General Assembly shall prescribe." ^ 

After so much discussion in the constitutional convention 
of the establishment of a free school system with its proper 
officers, the constitution of 1847 is singularly silent on educa- 
tional provisions. 

Nevertheless, the common school leaders in the State 
kept right on trying "to erect upon a permanent basis a 
plain, practical system of Free Common Schools. The great 
fundamental principle of this action should be, that our 
schools be free to every child (native or adopted) in Illinois, 
free as the genial showers and sunshine of heaven. ' "■ 

The State Educational Society authorized the publication 
of a magazine, the Illinois Teacher, devoted to the cause of 
common schools and resolved, ' ' That the property of the State 
should be taxed to educate the children of the State. ' ' ^ 

The same attitude toward taxation was shown by some 
of the educational associations of the northern and western 



"Jr. Const. Conv., p. 3 52. 
«Jr. Const. Conv., p. 352. 
'State Supt. Rep.. 1885-86. p. 166. 
* Prairie Farmer, v. 8, p. 81. 



144 

counties, a typical resolution from which is this : "Eesolved, 
That Common Schools should be free to all, both black and 
white, and being thus free and accessible to the poor as well 
as the rich, neither rich nor poor should be allowed to de- 
prive their children of the means of a Good Common School 
Education. ' '® 

Of course, the common, though true and sincere, argu- 
ments advanced, were that free institutions could only suc- 
ceed by free schools. ^'That the whole people, without dis- 
tinction of age, sex, or condition, shall have unrestrained 
access to the fountains of public instruction, in order that 
our free institutions may be transmitted to posterity in unde- 
cayed magnificence. ' ' ^° 

Infrequently a moral persuasion for the necessity of 
educating the children said, "it is the duty of the State to 
educate every child in it. There could not be a more rational, 
patriotic or benevolent expenditure of wealth than in the 
holy cause of education, and thus the moral improvement of 
our population." 

Governor French, who had been ex-o£ficio state superin- 
tendent, asked the legislature to repeal all school laws and 
start anew with a simple system of education supported by 
tax on property, and made free to all children alike. ''I desire 
to see a system by which every child, whatever its condition 
or parentage, may have an opportunity to obtain an education 
equal with the most affluent of our state — such as will fit 
them for any grade or condition of life." ^~ 

Governor Matteson, following Governor French in 
office, made a somewhat similar statement: *' Intelli- 
gence gives to the country happiness at home and re- 
spect abroad * * *. Why not open its portals wide and 
make its benefits universal? * * * I now repeat that 
the laws in relation to schools be repealed, and that in 
the place of them a simple law be passed — by which ^ a 
general system of schools shall be established, and main- 
tained entirely by levies (so far as the school fund shall 
be insufficient) upon property open and free to every child 
within the borders of the state. This recommendation con- 

» Prairie Farmer, vol. 8, p. 335. 
10 Ibid., p. 221. 

"Sangamo Jr.. July 20, 1847. 
"Sen. and House Rep.. 1853. p. 8. 



145 

templates a system of instruction of a character sufficiently 
elevated to fit every child for every rank and station in 
life."^' 

The legislature though unready to inaugurate those 
ideas into laws immediately, did create a separate department 
of public instruction. With a capable man as state superin- 
tendent, it was thought that the cause of the common schools 
would be advanced most rapidly. A brighter day for educa- 
tion was at hand. Governor Matteson, in 1854, appointed Nin- 
ian W. Edwards, son of the first territorial governor of Illi- 
nois, and a man who had held the office of attorney general and 
been a member of the state legislature for sixteen years, the 
first state superintendent."'' Mr. Edwards was charged with 
the duty of reporting ''a bill to the next regular session of 
the General Assembly, for a system of free school education 
throughout the State, and the manner for the support of 
which system to be provided for by a uniform ad valorem 
tax upon property, to be assessed and collected as other state 
and county revenue is assessed and collected." ^* 

Mr. Edwards, complying with the request of the legisla- 
ture, reported a thoroughly comprehensive bill with the rea- 
sons for its passage. The bill provided for the election and 
duties of the state superintendent ; the election and duties of 
school commissioners; the election, duties and powers of 
township boards of education; judgments and executions 
against school boards ; the examination, qualification and 
•duties of teachers; school libraries; township and county 
school funds ; common school funds, and additional taxes for 
the support of schools. 

The legislature accepted the bill but made some modifica- 
tions by keeping the district system, which had been excluded, 
and by imposing a state tax for education. The tax amounted 
to two mills on the dollar, and was added in the distribution 
to other funds which, made up the common school fund 
**The common school fund of this state shall consist of such 
sums as will be produced by an annual le\^ and assessment 
of two mills upon each dollar's valuation of all taxable pro- 

" Prairie Farmer, 1854, p. 102. 

"» The legislature enacted a law creating a separate office of Superintendent 
of common schools in 1854. It made it the immediate duty of the governor 
to fill the office until the November election of 1855 

"State Supt. Rep., 1885-86. p. 190. 



146 

perty in the state, and there is hereby levied and assessed 
annually, in addition to the revenue for state purposes, the 
said two mills upon each dollar's valuation of all the taxable 
property in the state, to be collected and paid as other revenue 
is collected and paid", etc.^^ 

In the next place, the law of 1855 made it mandatory that 
the trustees of both townships and local districts should levy 
a tax to supplement the distributable fund of the State. At 
least one free school in every district should be established 
and kept in operation six months out of each year. In addi- 
tion, ''for the purpose of erecting schoolhouses, or purchas- 
ing schoolhouse sites, or for the repairing and improving the 
same, for procuring furniture, fuel and district libraries, the 
board of education of any district shall be authorized to have 
levied and collected a tax annually on all property in their 
district."^' 

It seemed that there was some misunderstanding, inten- 
tional or otherwise, over the purposes for which a tax could 
be levied. Hence the law of 1859 restated that provision 
more specifically. "For the purpose of establishing and 
supporting free schools for six months, and defraying all 
expenses of the same, of every description; for the purpose 
of repairing and improving schoolhouses; of procuring fur- 
niture, fuel, libraries and apparatus, and for all other neces- 
sary incidental expenses, the directors of each district shall 
be authorized to levy a tax, annually, upon all the taxable 
property of the district. They may also appropriate to the 
purchase of libraries and apparatus, any surplus funds, after 
all necessary school expenses are paid." ^^ 

Since there was a fund to be distributed to the common 
schools by the state, provision was made in the law to base 
two-thirds of the distribution on the number of white children 
in each county between five and twenty-one years of age, and 
one-third on the number of townships or parts of townships 
in each county. ''On the first Monday in Jime, in each and 
every year, next after taking the census of the state, the 
auditor of public accounts shall, under the supervision of the 
commissioners of the school fund of the state, ascertain the 



^= Sess. Laws, 1855, Sec. 67, p. 77. 
" Sess. Laws. 1855, Sec. 71. p. 78. 
" 111. Teach., v. 5, p. 3 of Circular of State Supt. 



147 

number of white children in each county in the state, under 
twenty-one years of age, and shall thereupon make a dividend 
to each county of two-thirds the sum from the tax levied and 
collected; and the interest due on the school, seminary and 
college fund, in proportion to the number of white children 
in each county under the age aforesaid, and of the remaining 
one-third, in proportion to the number of townships and parts 
of townships in each county." '^ 

Finally, the money due the townships should be distri- 
buted ^ ' in proportion to the number of days certified on such 
schedules respectively to have been taught since the last 
regular return day fixed by the act or trustees for the return 
of schedules." ^^ 

The greatest objections to the free school law, Avhich 
taxed property for the support of education, were obviated 
by the method of distributing the state school fund. The more 
thickly populated sections benefited by the distribution on 
the number of children under twenty-one years of age. The 
sparser districts were helped by the distril3ution on the num- 
ber of townships or fractions thereof per county. Moreover, 
the richer sections, which might also have the greatest num- 
ber of minors, paid the biggest share of the tax. Cook county 
paid out $65,150.31, and received $29, 185.02, while William- 
son county paid out $1,737.04, and received $4,917.25.^^^ It is 
easily seen, therefore, that the state tax distribution method 
was a powerful argument that carried in poorer sections 
where other reasons failed. The principle of distributing 
state money, collected from the richer sections, to help poorer 
districts was first used after 1855. 

The Attitude to the Free Schools. 

Quite frequently the attitude to the common schools be- 
came one of defense for, or objection to the private 
academies and select schools. Occasionally, the semi-public 
academies were included in the condemnation. The struggle 
concerned itself, therefore, for the supremacy of one system 
of education over another. Should leaders in society, and 
they alone from the wealthy people, be educated by the acad- 

"Sess. Laws, 1S55, Sec. 69, p. 78. 
19 Ibid.. Sec. 36, p. 61. 

"a Sangamon county paid out $2-3,440.75, and received $12,412.82. See Audi- 
tor's Report for 1855-6, p. 35-6. 



148 

emies, thus leaving the poor people to shift for themselves? 
Or, should the State adopt a system of free education espe- 
cially favorable to the common man? It did adopt such a 
system in 1855, with the result that its friends began to sing 
its praises. The virtues usually found were superior in the 
common schools, inferior in the academies. 

First and pre-eminent, Avere the arguments from demo- 
cracy. The children of the rich and the poor, the high and the 
low, were all on the same level in the common schools. Re- 
wards and punishments, success and failure came as a result 
of individual merit rather than distinction from wealth and 
parentage. In the light of our republican institutions, pri- 
vate schools were a failure. ''They were the nurseries of 
aristocracy ; not the aristocracy which despises the poor man 
because he is poor — which calls men of moderate means, small 
listed farmers, greasy mechanics, and filthy operators, unfit 
to associate with well-bred gentlemen, and says free society 
is a failure, which threatens the overthrow of republicanism, 
and is hard upon our free schools : " ^° 

Private schools, pushed to their logical conclusions, 
would divide the American people into classes entirely con- 
trary to our traditions. Not only would the rich and poor 
be separated, but ''there must be schools to represent particu- 
lar nationalities and particular forms of belief. And this 
would perpetuate national peculiarities, and embitter reli- 
gious prejudices and beget a clannish spirit, and divide society 
more and more into parties estranged and hostile to each 
other, when every effort should be bound together by friendly 
intercourse in universal sympathy and concord. And I know 
of no minor agency to affect this than a well devised and well 
sustained system of common public schools. "^^ 

In the common schools "and the humbler walks of life, 
where talent is oftenest found, the gifted and good — educate 
and qualify themselves for the responsible positions in 
life."-- 

Common schools, universally established, would enable 
parents, "to educate their children at home, where they can 
counsel with the teacher in the formation of the child's char- 



»I11. Teach., v. 4, p. 78. 
21 Ibid., p. 87. 
"Ibid., p. 79. 



149 

acter, and where tliej^ can detect and check those tendencies 
to evil to which most children are prone." -^ 

Besides, private schools and academies were located 
where they were least needed. ''The private school system 
will never plant schools where they are needed to meet the 
wants of the entire community. Hence some, nay, many 
would under it be excluded from all school privileges by loca- 
tion. Teachers will of course choose to establish schools only 
in dense and wealthy communities, where good compensation 
will be assured to them, and the poorer and more sparsely 
settled sections of the countrv will be left altogether unsui)- 
plied."'* ^ 

Even though academies were rightly located, ''they are 
too expensive for general use. Teachers must live ; and pri- 
vate schools must charge a rate of tuition per scholar which 
will support the teacher or teachers, and afford a superior 
mcome sufficient to pay rent for buildings and fixtures, and 
this Avill make education much more expensive to scholars 
than when the property is taxed to support the schools of 
the district. And especially does this private school system 
press heavily upon those in the community who are rich only 
in mouths to be filled, backs and feet to be covered, and bills 
to be paid. Multitudes of children must remain untaught if 
only this system be in operation among us." ^^ 

Finally, the private school teacher sacrificed efficiency 
for popularity with pupils, which meant popularity with the 
parents. Some thought that popularity was incompatible 
with the proper handling of pupils, because the onlv concern 
of the teacher should be to knoAv and do his duty.^ Wealth 
ought not make any difference in the children's school privi- 
leges. But common school pupils paid only thirtv dollars, 
where academic pupils paid ninety dollars for instruction. 

However, it was recognized that the academy had some 
advantages. (1) "The teachers in the private schools, as a 
class, are superior in natural endoAATnents and scientific at- 
tamments to the teachers in the public schools. They must 
be so to sustain themselves. No private school with inferior 
teachers at its head ever had more than an ephemeral exist- 
e^ce; while nme-tenths of the public schools, taking the coun- 

=^I1I. Teach., p. 80. 
*'Ibid., p. 87. 
"Ibid., p. 86. 



150 

try through, are supplied with teachers of an inferior grade, 
unfit to be trusted with the molding of immortal minds. ' ' ^"^ 
(2) The equipment and apparatus was far superior in the 
academies. (3) The academies had a more enriched curri- 
culum while public school education was "confined to the 
intellect at the expense of manners, morals, and the organic 
structure. Better no education, than such education. It only 
tends to make rognes."^^ 

It is evident therefore, that the State was divided into 
two groups, the one favoring public schools, the other acad- 
emies. The south, generally, wanted to be left alone with 
its original class system of education. On the other hand, the 
north wanted to impose its common school system on all alike, 
the State over. The attitude of the two sections can be clearly 
obtained by studying the literature of each of the two groups. 
Many times the south was bitterly opposed to the common 
school, while the north eulogized it. 

"We have got to hating everything with the prefix free, 
from free negroes up and down through the whole catalogues 
— free farms, free labor, free society, free will, free thinking, 
free children, and free schools — all belonging to the same 
brood of damnable isms ; but the worst of all these abomina- 
tions is the modern system of free schools. We abominate 
the system because the schools are free."-^ 

The other attitude follows : ' ' We dedicate it to freedom ; 
to humanity; to advancing civilization of the ages; to an 
ever onward, ever upward, and ever glorious career of con- 
joined knowledge and industry, science and art, justice and 
humanity. In a word, we dedicate it to the human race, to 
Christ, and to God, to the truth they enjoin, the beneficence 
they inspire, and the glory they impart ; and should any ever 
in the future attempt to divert or hinder it from these great 
ends, this glorious career, we this day pray that their hands 
and their tongues may become palsied and powerless ; that its 
beams and rafters may cry out against them, and its very 
bricks and stones confront and repel them; and that, ever 
guarding its own vestal fire within, it may throw far abroad 
the radiance of its own light — resplendent and beneficient to 

» 111. Teach., v. 4, p. 77. 
2' Ibid. 
=»Ibid., p. 79. 



151 

all on earth — accepted and blessed by all in Heaven; and 
that from age to age tlie zephyrs may still waft the sweet 
music of its love over the green grass where its founders rest 
as successive generations of youthful voices arises to call 
them the blessed of the Lord."^^ 

Ex-Gov. Eeynolds, at this time, wrote a little book urging 
the people of the south to accept the free school law. The 
repeal of the Missouri Compromise through the Dred Scot 
Decision, and the birth of the Republican party kindled anew 
the sectional feeling. So it is doubtful whether his book had 
a wide circulation and much influence in the interests of free 
education in the southern part of the State. 

S. W. Moulton, who managed the free school law in the 
legislature, spoke of it, about the time Reynolds wrote his 
book, as having aroused the people from apathy because their 
interest lay where their money was spent. The property tax 
led, therefore, to suggestions and improvements in the law 
that could not be foreseen until experience was obtained by 
practice. 

Since there were two extreme beliefs over the free school 
bill depicted, and since it appears that the opposition was 
connected with slavery, and in justice to both the North and 
the South, it would be in order to state from the evidence 
which we have what each section contributed and what its 
attitude has been to education. 

The academy was supported alike by both sections, it 
having been first introduced by the Soutli because southerners 
settled Illinois first. Though it operated in both sections for 
the education of leaders, the children of the poor were to be 
educated gratis, and a common school department for the 
"public" was usually attached. Manual labor was adopted 
principally to make it economically possible for the less 
wealthy to receive an education. 

The apprentice laws were of southern origin, and the 
indentures were usually those of negroes or raulattoes. The 
explanation of the introduction of the apprenticeship system 
by the way of the South instead of the North lies in the fact 
that the northerner did not come until only the vestiges of 
indentures remained' in the older eastern states; while the 



2»I11. Teach., v. 4, p. 185. 



152 

southern immigration took place at an earlier time when the 
apprenticeship system was a little more common. 

To the South should be attributed the enactment of the 
first free school law- in 1825. The poor and ignorant for 
whom it was especially designed to benefit objected because 
they did not understand its benefits and could not pay the 
necessary tax for the support of schools. The South was 
wholly to blame for the repeal of the laAV. 

Again, the South forged to the front in the proposed leg- 
islation for free schools, and county normal schools which 
were to be supported as the academies were in Kentucky and 
Virginia, but these plans w^ere finally rejected by a legislature 
whose majority consisted of representatives from the older 
southern counties in Illinois. 

The adoption of the recommendation of the representa- 
tive leaders from both sections for a state superintendent of 
common schools failed, but the office was vested ex-officio in 
that of the Secretary of State. This was probably patterned 
after the Pennsylvania type.^° 

However, the resolutions, recommendations and petitions 
for a separate state superintendent came almost exclusively 
from the newer counties of the northern and western sections 
which were settled by New Englanders and easterners.^' 

The growth of the question of taxation is illustrative of 
the attitude of northern and southern Illinois toward free 
schools. The legislature, besides granting the right of taxa- 
tion for school purposes in a few city charters, passed a gen- 
eral law in 1845 which allowed communities to levy a pro- 
perty tax b}^ a two-thirds majority vote for school purposes. 
The taxing clause was changed in 1848 to a majority vote. 

The first report, issued in 1849, which dealt with an ad 
valorem property tax for schools, showed that $29,947.46 was 
voluntarily levied by the people. Thirty of the counties levy- 
ing such tax were in the northern part of the State, while six 
were in the southern part. In 1852, $51,101.14 were likewise 
voluntarily levied by forty-three counties, thirty-six of which 
were northern and seven southern. Of the twenty-six coun- 



3" Assembly Reports, 1844, p. 103. 

=» Assembly Reports. 1846. 1849, 1851, 1853. Jr. Const. Con., 1847. 



153 

ties that did not levy a tax, eighteen were southern and eight 
northern counties.^" 

In the senate, the free school bill of 1855 passed by a vote 
of 20 to 3, and in the honse, 47 to 14. An analysis of the vote 
relative to the section from which the representatives came 
shows that most of the opposition was in the southern tier 
of counties stretching to the east and southeast of St. Louis 
across the State. 

Therefore, it is evident that the opposition to the idea 
of free education came from the old southern portion of the 
State. This probably was not due to the fact that these people 
w^ere southern in origin for such leaders as Coles, Duncan and 
Edwards, always champions of free schools, migrated to Illi- 
nois from the South; but rather the opposition finds its ex- 
planation in the fact that the southern districts were econ- 
omically much less able to support free schools than the fer- 
tile and commercial northern sections. 

Before discussing the beginnings and characteristics of 
the high school, a summary of the free school law of 1855 fol- 
lows. The constitutional convention of 1847 accepted the 
first reading of a bill which pro\ided for a free system of 
public schools, and a state superintendent to give the pro- 
posal effect, but the convention omitted all mention of free 
schools in the final draft of the constitution. However, the 
leaders, associations and editors continued to agitate the 
same question until the legislature authorized the separation 
of the Department of State and the schools. It also author- 
ized the appointment of a state superintendent and required 
that he prepare a bill for the reorganization of a school 
system, which bill was adopted in 1855. A state tax of two 
mills was levied on every dollar of property and the income 
added to the annual distribution of the common school fund ; 
a local tax was levied by the trustees of both township and 
district to help maintain at least one free school in every 
district for six months in the year. The state common school 
fund was distributed in such a manner that two-thirds was 
given to the county on the basis of the number of white chil- 
dren between the ages of five and twenty-one years, and the 
remaining one-third on the basis of the number of townships, 

'2 Assembly Reports, 1849, p. 116; 1853, p. 149. 



154 

or parts of townships in each county. The money due the 
townships was to be distributed in proportion to the number 
of days of school that were actually taught. 

The method of distribution of the state school fund, 
which benefited the poorer sections as well as the richer dis- 
tricts was a powerful argument in favor of free schools. 
They were democratic; they were the means by which chil- 
dren could be educated at home ; they were located where they 
were needed ; they were inexpensive. On the other hand, the 
successful academies had superior teachers ; they were better 
equipped; they had more extensive subjects of study. Thus 
two sharply defined groups existed in the State; the one 
favored the common school, the other favored the academy. 
At one extreme, the free school was placed in a class with 
free negroes ; at the other, it was eulogized. How the common 
school supplied some of the secondary education of the time 
follows. 



155 



CHAPTER XII. 



The Beginnings and Characteristics of the Free Puhlic High 

School of 1860. 

The high school as a separate institution was not usually 
so designated, and thought of, until quite a while after the 
passage of the free school law of 1855. The academy had 
long been the means of secondary education, but the common 
school had even before 1850 begun to usurp the province of 
the former institution. The academy was the chief means of 
providing education for the aristocracy of society. The 
common people had no way to gain similar advantages for 
their children. The academy was open to them, but tuition 
charges, the cost of sending children to live away from home 
combined with the inaccessibility of the academy, kept the 
common children at home. But the working men were imbued 
with high ideals. Their children must have advantages pro- 
vided that the parents missed. The common school was the 
only way open. That humble institution struggled along until 
we see it occupying the center of the stage of political and 
educational thought. Though it was called the common 
school, by 1860 it came to mean both the elementary school 
and the high school. ''The high school and the common school 
are part of the same system. The one is the head, the other 
the heart. One is the branches, the other the root. ' ' ^ 

One of the chief ways by which the high school came to 
be the upper part of the common school system was through 
gradation. The very first mention of that idea, applied to 
the common schools, was the suggestion of that subject in an 
article for contribution to the Common School Advocate, in 
1837. A year later, the Sangamo Journal printed an article 
on the system of schools in the State in which gradation was 
suggested. 

> 111. Teach., v. 8, p. 49. 



156 

**In addition to the primary schools * * * we must have 
academies or high schools and colleges. The first finishing 
the education of many of its students whose means will not 
permit them to pursue it farther, and only the more thorough- 
ly preparing others to enter the second, where alone their 
scholastic pursuits can be closed." ^ 

The Prairie Farmer in 1844 advocated the establishment 
of a school system with three departments, because it depre- 
cated the growing influence of the academies. ''And what 
shall be the remedy? We do not expect a community justly 
appreciating education, and desirous of affording to their 
children the means of procuring the higher branches, will 
rest passive with inferior schools, neither would we desire 
any such lowering of the standard of education. But instead 
of creating independent select schools, we would have a plan 
something after this sort adopted. In the first place, the 
district should be large, and as the school increased, instead 
of dividing districts, sending large and small children to the 
same school, the school should be divided, classifying the 
scholars according to their progress. Where the number of 
scholars would admit of it, there should be at least three 
grades of schools. For the small children, say under ten 
years of age, female teachers should be employed, and the 
schools should be as numerous as possible, to facilitate attend- 
ance. For the next grade, the instruction and number of 
schools should depend upon circumstances. For the highest 
grade, there should be but one school within a circuit of at 
least three miles diameter, no matter how thickN settled the 
town if under ten or fifteen thousand inhabitants, and gen- 
erally there should be but one such school to a township, and 
occasionally but one in a county."^ 

Next, educational conventions discussed the merits of 
gradation and advocated the adoption of such a scheme in 
their resolutions. "Resolved, That it be earnestly recom- 
mended to school officers to establish such a classification 
of studies and gradation of schools as will prevent the great 
waste of time, effort, and money, to which our schools are now 
subject; and that experience proves the feasibility and profit 
of the following system of gradation : ' ' 

*San. Jr., Apr. 21, 1838. 
•State Supt. Rep., 1885, p. 160. 



157 

First. Primary schools, in which as many of the young- 
est pupils shall be taught in the full rudiments of education 
as one female teacher can instruct. ' ' 

'Second. Grammar schools, both male and female, in 
which the elementary and common English studies shall be 
pursued, viz. — Geographj^, Written Arithmetic, Grammar, 
Reading, Spelling, and Writing; the number of these schools 
being smaller and the number of pupils larger than the lower 
grade ' '. 

''Third. One high school for each large town or city, 
in which the higher English branches and Languages shall be 
taught; the pupils to be admitted by examination from the 
Grammar schools, and those of Grammar schools in the same 
manner from the Primary schools." * 

From the above typical citations, the first scheme of 
gradation included three departments, namely, primary, 
grammar, and high. Now, a territorial basis was also neces- 
sary. More primary than grammar schools should be estab- 
lished, and one higher department serving for many of the 
others. To carry out that idea, the policy of joining districts 
grew up, and the name, union, or union graded schools, be- 
came somewhat common. 

The idea of establishing union districts by law was slow 
in developing. The law of 1825 provided that there should 
be at least fifteen families in a school district, but the amend- 
ment of 1827 said that there must be at least eighteen children 
going to school or subscribed, and the amendment in 1829 
made the size of a district a purel}^ voluntary affair. The 
legislature, in 1841, provided for the appointment of township 
trustees who were to establish districts within the to^vnship 
as suited the convenience and wishes of the people ; as many 
schools could be kept in a district as the people desired. Six 
years later an additional amendment provided, "that dis- 
tricts may be altered at any time by said trustees to suit the 
wishes of a majority of the inhabitants in the districts inter- 
ested,"^ and that children might be transferred from one dist- 
rict to another. By 1853, the practice of creating union dist- 
ricts had grown considerably so that the legislature occa- 
sionally legalized the action of some directors : 

* Prairie Farmer, v. 8, p. 273. 
•Sess. Laws, 1847, p. 130, sec. 46. 



158 

''Sec. 3. Said district shall be called Union School Dist- 
rict, and shall have, enjoy, possess and exercise all rights, 
powers, privileges, advantages and innnunities of other school 
districts, shall be entitled to its equal and joint proportions 
of the school funds, and shall be organized, regulated, con- 
trolled and governed by the laws of the state now in force, 
or that may be hereafter passed." " 

The free school law, two years later, provided for the 
establishment of union districts: ''Whenever it may be 
desirable to establish a school composed of pupils, residents 
of two or more districts, or two or more townships, 
it shall be the duty of the respective boards of 
Education of each of such townships to transfer such 
number of the pupils residing in such townships 
as the boards may deem proper to the school so established 
in the township in which the school house is or may be 
located; but the enumeration of scholars shall be taken in 
each of such to^vnships as if no such transfer had been made ; 
and such school funds of the respective townships in Avhich 
the pupils composing such school shall reside, and from which 
they shall have been transferred ; and the board of that town- 
ship in which the school house where such school is located 
shall have the control and management of such school ; and the 
boards of each of such townships so connected for school pur- 
poses shall each pay its respective share of the entire ex- 
penses of every kind incurred in the establishment and sup- 
port of such school, to be computed in proportion to the num- 
ber of pupils residing in each of such to^^mships composing 
such school; and each board of the townships from which 
jjupils are transferred shall draw an order on its township 
treasurer, signed by its president, in favor of the township 
treasurer whose board shall have the control and management 
of such school, as the case may be, for the amount of its share 
of the entire expenses aforesaid of such school, and the board 
of the township having control and management as aforesaid 
of such school shall pay out of its treasury the whole amount 
required for the establishment and maintenance of such 
schools, in the manner as provided in this act for the 
establishment and maintenance of other schools; Provided, 



•Sess. Laws, 1853, p. 186. 



159 

however, by agreement of the several boards interested 
therein, said school may be placed under the control and 
management of such persons as may be determined by a 
majority of said boards. ' ' ^ 

The Illinois Teacher gave the reason for the name, union 
schools, thus: "They are called Union Schools because they 
afford all the advantages of a well conducted common or 
select school and academy for gentlemen, and the seminary 
for ladies; they are called graded because the pupils are 
classified according to their attainments ; in such, the scholar 
may commence with the alphabet and pass from one grade to 
another, until prepared to engage in the common pursuits 
of life, or enter any college or university. ' ' ^ 

Therefore, it is quite evident that the high school was a 
part of the union graded system. Moreover, it was essential 
to the union graded schools to have a high school as the cap- 
stone. **Our Union Graded Schools have demonstrated to 
the most skeptical that by adopting this plan they can have 
schools, apparatus and libraries, equal, if not superior, to 
our private institutions, with but a small additional expense 
to the present system. We look upon the establishment of the 
Union Graded, or Central High School to be essential to the 
free school system. ' ' ^ 

The scheme of gradation was advocated somewhat vigor- 
ously over the State because its advocates believed that it was 
economical; that it was a stimulus to exertion on the part 
of the pupil ; that classification could be made on merit ; that 
the school system would become a selective agent; that a 
broader range of studies was possible ; that school work could 
be made continuous ; that more expert teaching was possible ; 
and that better organization and administration resulted.^'' 

From the above advantages of gradation, as were pointed 
out in educational thought, the framers of educational legis- 
lation were induced to make provision for graded schools in 
the bill of 1854. Township boards ' ' shall have power to estab- 
lish schools of different grades, to assign such number of 
scholars to such schools as they may think best, and to control 

'Sess. Laws, 1855, p. 61, sec. 37. 
»I11. Teach., v. I, p. 257. 
•Ibid. V. 4, p. 6. 

*" These arguments are greatly expanded in the Illinois Teacher, Volume 
4, page 90. 



160 

and regulate the admission of scholars to schools of the higher 
and ditferent grades, and if on account of great distance or 
difficulty of access to the schools in any township, or on ac- 
count of the scholar being too far advanced to prosecute his 
studies in any school in his township, any of the pupils could 
be more conveniently accommodated in any other schools, 
academies or colleges in this State, the board of education 
shall have the power to make an arrangement by which such 
pupils may be instructed in the most convenient school, acad- 
emy or college in this state, and the expense of such instruc- 
tion shall be paid out of the public funds, as may be agreed 
upon by the board of education. ' ' " 

The high school developed as a part of the common school 
system when the common schools became graded into pri- 
mary, grammar and higher departments. It is true that the 
gradation of each of the departments took place next, but we 
are only concerned now with the last department. The acad- 
emy may be said to have represented the upper part of the 
common school system in an ungraded form, with some en- 
richment of the curriculum. With the great power of the 
State behind the free common schools, the private schools 
and academies could not compete. Many of the private in- 
stitutions accordingly, asked the state superintendent how 
they could be changed into high or union graded schools 
under the present law. By the law of 1855, as amended in 
1857 and 1859, two methods were open : 

1. The directors of all the districts that wanted to unite 
should determine the number of scholars to attend the new 
school, should erect, rent or purchase a building and should 
levy a tax on each district in proportion to the number of 
pupils therefrom. The academy buildings might be so 
selected, and the directors in the district where the school was 
to be located should have its control and management. 

2. All district directors might elect three trustees to be 

styled, directors of union district No. , in to^vnship 

No. . The union directors should have power to levy a 

tax on all property of the union district. Pupils should be 
admitted from outside the union district under such rules as 
the trustees should see fit to establish. 



"State Supt. Rep., 1854, p. 30. 



161 

The diiference in the two methods lay in the fact that, in 
the first, the tax was to be levied on each district in propor- 
tion to the number of pupils therefrom and the care of the 
school rested in the hands of the directors where the school 
was located. By the second plan, the directors were the trus- 
tees of the entire union district with the power to levy taxes 
on all of the property in the union district. Finally, the school 
was under the control of the directors representing the whole 
district. 

By these provisions, private institutions could become 
public. Whether they did or not must be proved by investiga- 
tion, although the state superintendent said, ''that nearly 
two-thirds of all the private Academies and Seminaries that 
existed in the state have thrown up their organizations and 
reorganized under the Common School law."" 
A list of Illinois High Schools in Existence at the Beginning 

of the Civil War. 

The ordinary conception is that few free high schools 
were in existence in the United States before the Civil War.. 
But investigations in Massachusetts, Ohio and Illinois have 
shown that an unexpected number were in operation. Cer- 
tainly those institutions were not our present day high schools 
any more than early Harvard and Yale were the universities 
we know today. The characteristics of the high schools 
in Illinois before the Civil War were clearly enough marked 
out to warrant the use of the term— high school. 

Then, we shall give a few examples to show how we have 
concluded that the free high schools were established as given 
in the table below. First, let us take Chicago. The legis- 
lature, March 1, 1839, gave the city council power to tax for 
schools. 

"Sec. 3. The Common Council of the City of Chicago 
shall have power to raise all sufficient sums of money, by 
taxing the real and personal estates in said city, for the 
following purposes, to wit : To build school houses ; to estab- 
lish, support and maintain common and public schools, and 
to supply the inadequacy of the school fund for the payment 
of teachers; to purchase or lease a site or sites for school 
houses ; to erect, hire or purchase buildings suitable for said 

" As an example of reorganization, see the special act allowing Crystal 
Lake Academy to reorganize. Sess. Laws, 1857, p. 1223. 



162 

school houses; to keep in repair and furnish the same with 
necessary fixtures and furniture whenever they may deem it 
expedient; and the taxes for that purpose shall be assessed 
and collected in the same manner that other city taxes are or 
may be." ^" 

Therefore, a free high school could have been estab- 
lished in Chicago. About 1840, the schools of the city were 
reorganized and the board of inspectors in their annual re- 
port said ''Had we the means, the establishment of a High 
School, with two good teachers, into which might be placed 
a hundred of the best instructed scholars from different 
schools, would remedy this increasing evil." ^^ 

The school committee, in 1844, advocated a high school 
for advanced pupils. "The lower story to be divided into 
two rooms, one for small boys and another for small girls, 
the upper room to be so divided as to give necessary recita- 
tion rooms for a High School, so that one Principal Teacher 
.and two or three assistants shall be able to conduct the sev- 
eral schools, and thus give it a High School in which may be 
placed the more advanced scholars." " 

Again, in 1846, the inspectors called the attention of the 
common council to the need of "at least one school where the 
ordinary academic studies may be taught. ' ' ^^ 

The school committee, the next year, in its report said, 
*'In reference to a High School, they are of the opinion that 
there are insuperable objections to the establishment of such 
a school, independent of the inability of the city at the present 
time to build one." ^^ 

However, a special committee reported a plan to the city 
council for the establishment of a high school, and gave the 
reasons why the city should have such an institution. There 
upon, Dec. 11, 1854, the city council "Ordered, That the 
Committee on Schools be directed to prepare an ordinance 
for the establishment of a High School in connection with our 
Public School System." 

"Ordered, That said Committee recommend a site for 
said School, and that the Superintendent of Public Schools 

" Sess. Laws, 1838-39, p. 215. 
"Chi. School Rep.. 1879, p. 4S. 
"Chi. School Rep., 1879, p. 48. 
1= Ibid. 
" Ibid. 



163 

be requested to furnish an outline plan of a building for the 
accommodation of said school." ^^ 

Jan. 23, 1855, the common council passed an ordinance 
establishing a high school, which institution was opened in a 
building erected for it, Oct. 1856. 

Next take Virginia. The law of 1845 made provision for 
the levying of taxes in any district where two-thirds of the 
voters decided to tax themselves for schools. This village 
took advantage of the law and a year later had a high school 
department in operation as appears from this quotation: 
*'We have a common school of grades in Virginia, commenced 
in July, conducted by two teachers, in separate departments, 
with eighty scholars, in which a thorough course of instruc- 
tion in the English branches of Education, in Mathematics, 
in' Latin, Greek, and French Languages, and in the orna- 
mental branches, are ably taught. We have a third depart- 
ment in the same building, liberally granted by the county 
commissioners' court for a nominal amount approved by the 
people, which will be fitted for use when the number of 
scholars justifies the employment of additional teachers * * * 
This school district and Beardstown * * * voted in May last 
the highest rate of taxation under the law. ' ' ^^ 

Similarly, a union school, with a high school department 
was in oyjeration in Rockton in 1851: "In the afternoon of 
the same day, we visited the Eockton Union School, under the 
Superintendence of Mr. Seely Perry, * * * In this school 
are realized more fully than in any other district in the county 
the advantages of a division of labor. There were about 160 
pupils in the school, embracing classes in all stages of prog- 
ress, from the alphabet up to the highest branches of classical 
and natural science taught in our best academies. ' ' ^^ 

Finally, communications, and the reports of the state 
agent who travelled for the establishment of free schools, 
showed that high schools were opened, many relatively per- 
manent, and some whose existence ended with the decay of 
the villages from economic conditions. The following table, 
perhaps, has omitted some high schools that were in existence. 



"Chi. School Rep. 1879, p. 50. 
^* Prairie Fancier, v. 6, p. 86. 
i»Ibid.. V. 11, p. 160. 



164 



but it shows that the free hi^h school had a good start by 
1860. 



Alton 1859 

Atlanta 1859 

Belleville ....I860 

Belvidere 1857 

Bloomington 1856 

New Boston 1860 

Briniiield 1860 

Canton 1862 

Chester 1856 

Chicago 1856 

Decatur 1856-62 

Dwight 1860 

DLxon 1857 

Eden 1856 

East Elgin 1856 

East Pawpaw 1856 

Franklin Grove 1856 

Freeport About 1851 

Fulton City 1860 

Galena, Male High 

School and Female 

High School 1857 

Galva ...1859 

Geneseo 1852-59 

Galesburg, but 

charged tuition 

for several years . . 1859-60 
Homer Seminary, 

changed to free 

school 1858 

Jacksonville, West. . .1851 
Jerseyville, mostly 

free 1853 

Joliet 1858 



Kewanee 1859 

Lacon 1858 

LeRoy 1856 

Lockport 1856 

Lee Union Center . . . 1859 

Lyndon 1847 

Mount Vernon Acad- 
emy, changed to 

free school 1856 

Nashville Academy, 
changed to free 

school 1858 

Ottawa 1857 

Paris 1856-66 

Sparta 1856 

Peoria 1856 

Plainfield 1856 

Princeton 1857-66 

Prairieville 1858 

Urbana Seminary, 
changed to free 

school 1856-58 

Quincy 1856 

Rockford 1862 

Rock Island 1858 

Rockton 1851 

Springfield 1858 

Vandalia 1858 

Virginia 1846 

Warsaw 1858 

Washington, T a z e - 

well Co 1858 

Waukegan 1856 

Wethersfield 1859 



Subjects of Study. 

Since the common school included a high school depart- 
ment in numerous instances, it is to be expected that second- 



165 

ary subjects of study existed along with elementary subjects. 
Either high school subjects were contemplated, or they were 
being taught in some common schools before the permanent 
free school law was passed. The county superintendent of 
Stark county hoped to have the common schools so perfected, 
' ' as to be able to teach, in the most approved manner, all that 
our children need to learn in order to fit them for the ordi- 
nary avocations of life. They not only need to know how 
to read and write and cipher, but to have some knowledge of 
History, Natural and Mental Philosophy, Political Economy, 
Chemistry, Physiology, Geology and Meteorology. All these 
may be profitably taught in our common schools." ^° 

However, in those communities where the town charter 
had given the common council the right to impose a tax for the 
support of schools, or in those places where the people were 
willing by a two-thirds and then later a majority vote to tax 
themselves for education, or where the schools were graded, 
there, subjects of an advanced nature were taught. Chicago 
common schools in 1847, were teaching, besides such sub- 
jects as reading, writing and arithmetic, Townes' Intellec- 
tual Algebra, Baley's Algebra, Preston's District School 
Book-keeping, Physiology, Gales' Philosophy and Gray's 
Chemistry. ' ' " 

In the Rockton Union School, subjects were taught "from 
the alphabet up to the highest branches of classical and natu- 
ral sciences taught in our best academies.""^ In Virginia, 
111., the common schools were graded so that in the upper 
division there was a ''thorough course of instruction in the 
English branches of education ; in mathematics ; in Latin, 
Greek, and French Languages, and in the ornamental 
branches. "^^ A union school at Freeport taught, besides the 
common branches, mathematics, natural and moral sciences, 
French, Greek and Latin. ^* At Carrollton, German, French, 
Latin, Greek and Spanish, in addition to the common 
branches, were taught in the common schools."^ The county 
superintendent of Peoria county reported that chemistry, 

*» Prairie Farmer, v. 12, p. 236. 

** Prairie Farmer, v. 7, p. 372. 

=» Prairie Farmer, v. II. 1851, p. 160. 

2* Prairie Farmer, v. 6, 1846, p. 86. 

"State Supt. Report. 1851, p. 230. 

« House Reports, 1853, p. 179. 



166 

algebra, physiology, ancient and United States history, and 
philosophy were taught in the common schools."" Will 
county included in the program for the common schools, as- 
tronomy, algebra, physiology, chemistry and philosophy." 
Moreover, subjects of secondaiy character were taught in 
some of the common schools in the counties of 
Champaign, Greene, Johnson, Jefferson, Marion, Pike, 
Saline, Stark, Lake and Woodford according to the 
reports of the county superintendents of those coun- 
ties for 1851.'^ Morgan county had a union graded 
school at Jacksonville wherein departments of study 
were included as far as those of college grade.^^ Jerseyville 
had a high school, mostly free, as a part of the common school 
system in which teachers were prepared for elementary in- 
struction.^" In Knox county, a union district building was 
constructed in which *Hhe plan to be pursued is to select a 
principal capable of teaching all the branches usually taught 
in a high school, with sufficient assistance to accomodate the 
whole district." ^^ 

The Prairie Farmer found that some of the common 
schools were teaching mental and written arithmetic, drawing, 
writing, spelling, mathematical, physical, civil and political 
geography, astronomy, English grammar, United States his- 
tory, physiology,, natural and mental philosophy, algebra, 
geometry, economics and the ornamental branches.^" 

The subjects in the common schools were not so extensive 
in scope as those taught in the academies, but they were quite 
similar. One reason for the likeness was that the common 
man took his cue from the classes above him. It was the 
fashion for, say, ''Ornamental Branches", to be taught to the 
children of the working people. While the parents' oppor- 
tunities had been limited, the study of Latin and Greek, as in 
the academies, would make their children cultured. When 
they were arguing for the common school, the leaders thus 
retained part of the philosophy of the academy in the curri- 
cula of the "people's college." The other reason was that 

** House Reports, 1851. app. of Supt. Report. 
"House Reports. 18.51, app. of Supt. Report. 
"House Reports, 1851, app. of Supt. Report. 
=» House Reports 1853, p, 163. 
*> House Reports 1853, p, 163. 
« House Reports, 1849. p. 113. 
'"Prairie Farmer, v. 10. 1850, p. 11. 



167 

the academies supplied many of the common teachers for the 
conmion schools. The teachers naturally taught those sub- 
jects which they studied in the academies. 

At the time of the passage of the free school law, which 
gave a decided impetus to the formation of high schools, the 
educational literature had quite a little about the kind of sub- 
ject matter, and its organization, that should be adopted by 
the high school. The Illinois Teacher printed the program 
of studies which appears in the list below for the guidance 
of school men. Chicago began its central high school in 
1856 with a two year curriculum for prospective teachers, 
a three year English curriculum and a four year English 
classical curriculum. Schools reorganizing under the free 
school law also were advised to study the Chicago curricula 
for suggestions. However, it is quite probable that most of 
the common schools enlarged their curricula gradually rather 
than creating others, de novo. The academies, reorganized 
by the law of 1855, probably continued the subjects that they 
had taught. At any rate, the core of the curricula that were 
suggested continued to urge the languages, mathematics, and 
philosophy, which w^ere the intellectual studies of the academy, 
as appears from the following programs of study : 

First Year. 

First Term — Latin, or English Analysis; Algebra, Elocu- 
tion and Orthography. 

Second Term — Latin, or English Analysis, Algebra, History. 

Third Term — Latin, or Elements of Physiology; Arithmetic; 
History. 

Second Year. 
First Term — Latin, or Rhetoric; Geometry; History or 
Greek. 

Second Term — Latin, or Rhetoric ; Geometry ; History or 
Greek. 

Third Term — Latin, or Bookkeeping; Algebra; Botany, or 
Greek. 

Third Year. 

First Term — Latin, or Natural History; Physical Geog- 
raphy; Trigonometry, or Greek 



168 

Second Term — Latin, or Surveying, etc. ; Physiology ; Natural 

Philosophy, or Greek. 
Third Term — Latin, or Evidence of Christianity; Eeview of 

Arithmetic, etc.; Astronomy, or Greek. 

Fourth Year. 

First Term — Mental Philosophy, or Latin; Rhetoric; 
Chemistry, or Greek. 

Second Term — Mental Philosophy, or Latin ; Civil Govern- 
ment; Geology, or Greek. 

Third Term — Moral Philosophy, or Latin; Review of Arith- 
metic, etc. ; Logic, or Greek. 

It will be seen that there are in reality three courses 
marked out in this report. The first is the General Course 
which the main body of the school may be supposed to pursue. 
It is that given in the scheme omitting the alternative 
branches. The second, is the course preparatory to College. 
It is the same as the General course for the first year; but in 
the second and third years, substitutes Greek, and in the 
fourth, Latin and Greek. It may be called the Collegiate 
course. The third is for those who prefer not to study Latin. 
It differs from the General Course by substituting other 
studies in the place of Latin for the first three years. It is 
the Imperfect Course. As sounder notions of Education be- 
come prevalent, this course will become less popular and the 
General Course more so. ' ' ^^ 

The normal training curriculum of the Chicago High 
School consisted of a review of the common branches, physical 
geography, general history, ancient geography, algebra, book- 
keeping, botany, astronomy, physiology, natural philosophy, 
chemistry, geology, rhetoric, political science, mental philoso- 
phy, moral science, etymology, English literature, reading, 
drawing, music, recitations and the theory and practice of 
teaching. 

The English course consisted of a review of the common 
branches, physical geography, general history, ancient geog- 
raphy, algebra, legendre, arithmetic, plane and spherical 
trigonometry, mensuration, surveying, navigation, book- 



'= 111. Teacher, v. 4. p. 400. 



169 

keeping, botany, astronomy, natural philosopliy, chemistry, 
geology, rhetoric, logic, economics, political science, mental 
philosophy, moral science, etymology, English literature, 
reading, drawing, music, German, French. 

The English classical curriculum added to the English 
curriculum, Latin, grammar and prose, Caesar, Cicero, Virgil 
and Greek.^^ 

None of the high schools over the State had such an ex- 
tensive program as the two above indicated. Peoria gave 
the following as the subjects taught in her high school in 1856: 

''First Class— Spelling in connection with etymology; 
read and define from the Fifth Reader ; Arithmetic completed 
and reviewed ; English Grammar. ' ' 

''Second Class— Mathematical and Physical Geography; 
Latin begam; Algebra; Bookkeeping; Spelling weekly." 

"Third Class— Geometry and Trigonometry; Latin con- 
tinued Natural Philosophy; Drawing; Spelling weekly." 

"Fourth Class— Chemistry; Latin continued; Rhetoric 
and Logic; Mental and Moral Philosophy; Reading and Elocu- 
tion; Spelling weekly. "^^ 

Greek w^as to be added if enough pupils, planning to go 
to college, warranted the formation of a class. 

Springfield had practically the same program. The first 
class was preparatory, and the other three classes offered 
Latin, Greek, mathematics, English, history and science.'*' ^ 

Galesburg had three grades in the high school which 
were designated as A, B, C. All of the common branches were 
taught and in addition, mathematics as high as algebra, 
science in the form of natural philosophy, three classes in 
Latin, physical geography and rhetoric, composed of essays, 
declamations and composition.'^ 

Finally, the programs of some of the reorganized acad- 
emies included such subjects as Latin, Greek, French, geom- 
etry, plane and spherical trigonometry, chemistry, philosophy 
and the common branches in preparation for the more ad- 
vanced work. 

From a study of the upper part of the common schools 
that were being graded, it must be concluded that some sub- 

' ^ Chicago Report, v. 3. 1856. p. 28. 
« Illinois Teacher, v. 2. 1856, p. 340. 
"Springfield Report. 1866, p. 26. 
»' Steele, History of the Galesburg Public Schools. 



170 

jects of a secondary nature were generally taught about the 
time of the enactment of the free school law. Moreover, it 
was customary to include a review of some of the common 
branches as the preliminary or preparatory work in the 
higher department. Therefore, the boundary between prim- 
ary and secondary education was loosely drawn for a period 
of about two decades, 1855-1875. 

What the province of each was had to be determined in 
actual practice. The high school as well as the elementary 
school was becoming an institution whose advantages were 
open to all the people. The primary schools no longer existed 
exclusively for the public and secondary education no longer 
was maintained exclusively as a privilege of the upper classes. 
The change to a vertical from a parallel system of education 
entailed no definite number of years in the length of the com- 
mon school system. No conclusive evidence has been found 
that the early free public high schools in Illinois had a four- 
year x^i'ogram. In fact, that length of time for secondary 
education was not used as a basis for the classification of high 
schools in the State until about 1880. 

Farthermore, the number of years in the grades was 
equally late of determination. The first mention of gradation 
in Illinois was in 1837, and the names, primary, intermediate 
and grammar designated departments which are still quite 
common. These departments began to be graded in the more 
progressive communities of the State by 1855, but there was 
little thought that a year's work in the elementary school 
should constitute one grade.' Some schools had ten grades 
with the tenth grade the beginning class, and the first grade 
the most advanced grade of the elementary school, but the 
length of the elementary school was about six years until 
1875. About that time the plan of making the first grade the 
first year of elementary school work and the adoption of eight 
years of eight grades was begun. Some schools added a year 
to the elementary grades to prepare for the high school ex- 
amination. The year so added was called the seventh grade. 
Other schools took the common branches or preparatory 
work out of the high school and added it to the elementary 
school. A few high schools retained what is now the eighth 
grade and made a longer high school period. Therefore the 



171 

length in years of the elementary schools and many of the 
high schools in Illinois is the result of a generation or more 
of development, 1850 to 1880, rather than the adoption, be- 
tween 1840 and 1850, of the plan of the eight year highly or- 
ganized volkschule of Prussia as Dr. Judd claims. 

High School Entrance Requirements. 

The academy, as has been shown in chapter four, ad- 
mitted almost anyone who was able and willing to pay for in- 
struction; the common school, from necessity, received part 
of its support in tuition charges before the free school law 
was passed. Neither were the equipment and the length of 
the term, nor the quality of instruction comparable to that 
which was given in the academy until advantages had been 
gained by the common school in public support, and in the 
classification and gradation of its pupils. One result of grad- 
ing the common school, was the imposition of standards that 
determined when a pupil finished one department and was 
ready to enter another. In other words, entrance require- 
ments were imposed which consisted of a combination of age 
and the completion of certain more or less formal work which 
had been set as a requirement of a particular department. 
Entrance to the primary school was usually based on age, 
while it was expected that one had completed the grammar 
school, or its equivalent, before entering the high school. 

At least twenty-six of the high schools — practically all of 
them growing out of the common school — listed above 
required that pupils entering the high school pass an ex- 
amination as a condition of entrance. In other words, en- 
trance requirements were characteristic of the free public 
high school by 1860. 

Taxation. 

It has been shown that the school law of 1825 provided 
for local taxes and the distribution of two per cent of the 
yearly State revenues for the maintenance of free schools. 
The legislature repealed the local tax in 1827, and the State 
tax in 1829. The tax feature of the bills of 1835 and 1841 
were annulled, but the legislature in 1845 gave any district 
the right to levy taxes by a two-thirds majority vote. Also, 
some cities were given special charters in which the right to 



172 

tax the people for the support of schools was granted. More- 
over, the same authority legalized the action of some school 
directors who had levied a tax for the maintenance of free 
schools at the instance of the people of the district. The final 
step was taken by the law of 1855, which made it mandatory 
to tax the people for the support of the schools.^^'' 

Since the high school had grown up as a part of the com- 
mon school in its process of gradation, or had been created by 
the city councils as a part of the public school system for the 
given city, or had been an academy that reorganized under 
the free school law, a second distinguishing characteristic was 
that it was publicly supported. 

Public School Boards. 

For a considerable time before the passage of the free 
school law, townships were incorporated for educational pur- 
poses under the control of elected trustees, and districts with- 
in the townships were established to suit the convenience of 
the people, and were administered by directors who w^ere 
elected for that purpose. The law of 1855 added the third 
step which made it possible to have directors of the districts 
that were to unite, appoint a board, to control the newly 
created union district. The interpretation by the State Super- 
intendent of the law of 1857, which was a restatement of some 
of the disputed sections of the law of 1855, made the board 
for the union district representative of the whole district. 
Finally, the legislature, in 1865, restated the union district 
clauses of the previous school laws, obviously to eliminate the 
troublesome questions of jurisdiction that had arisen in 
practice. 

'^A majority of the directors of each of two or more dis- 
tricts may consolidate said districts and appoint three di- 
rectors for the union district so formed, who shall be styled, 
*' Directors of Union District No. ..., Township No. ...," 
who shall have all the powers conferred by law upon other 
school directors. The proceedings of the act of consolidation 
shall be signed by a majority of each of the concurring boards 
of directors, and delivered to the trustees of the proper town- 



3'«The State tax for 1856 was $606,809.51; for 1866, $750,000. The local 
tax for 1856 was $341,964; for 1866, $2,078,335. Common school fund 1S56, was 
53,005,937. 



173 

ship, and shall be evidence of such consolidation, and upon 
receiving a copy of proceedings, it shall be the duty of the 
trustees to change the map of the township in accordance 
therewith, and file the same with the clerk of the county 
court. The separate boards of directors shall then be dis- 
solved and the union directors shall draw lots for their re- 
spective terms of office and be thereafter elected as provided 
in the forty-second section of the act."^* 

A free public high school not only was an institution that 
was supported by taxation, and that imposed entrance re- 
quirements which were based on elementary education, but it 
was an institution that was controlled by a board of directors 
who were elected by the people. 

The concluding paragraphs summarize the chapter. 
Public boards of education administered the high school and 
the common school as part of the same system, even though 
the former developed from the latter in the process of grada- 
tion and unionization. Schools were first graded into primary, 
grammar and high departments, and later, each department 
was graded. More primary than grammar, and more gram- 
mar than higher departments were necessary; hence the 
policy of creating union districts developed in which one in- 
stitution received the pupils from several districts. 

Private institutions reorganized under the free school 
law and received the benefits of public support. The resolu- 
tions adopted by city councils, the reports of the State Super- 
intendent and the State Agent, and newspaper articles showed 
that about fifty high schools were in operation in Illinois by 
1860. 

The subjects of study that were taught in some of the 
common schools were secondary as well as elementary, but a 
distinct attempt was made to introduce curricula for the use 
of the high school that had many of the features of the more 
formal subjects of the academy. However, pupils were gen- 
erally admitted to the high school only upon the completion 
of, and the formal examination in certain elementary sub- 
jects. The school itself was controlled and supported by the 
public. 

ssSess. Laws, 1865, p. 117. 



174 



CHAPTER XIII. 



The Establishment of the Free Public High School. 

The present high school system in the State of Illinois 
has developed solely neither from the township nor the inde- 
pendent district system, but rather it is the product of the 
growth of the township idea, of the evolution of union dis- 
tricts under special charter, and of the development of dis- 
tricts under general law. The purpose of this chapter, there- 
fore, is to consider these three phases in a general way. 

Toivnship High Schools. 

People of the central west have been familiar with the 
Northwest Ordinances which made land grants for school 
purposes on the basis of townships or subdivisions of them. 
In 1841, the legislature had gone so far as to allow the in- 
habitants of a township to become incorporated for the estab- 
lishment of public schools. By the same act, township trus- 
tees were to be elected whose duty it was to district the terri- 
tory to suit the wishes and convenience of the people in any 
neighborhood. However, many of the districts so established 
were too small to support all grades of the common school. 
Some localities had overcome that difficulty, by about 1850, 
by joining districts. Others advocated the outright adoption 
of a township basis for school organization. 

Supt. Edwards prepared the free school bill after that 
plan, but the legislature decided to cling to the mongrel dis- 
trict-township combination. However, some attempts were 
almost immediately made, in 1857, to adopt a large territory 
as the basis for the organization of a high school: 

' ' The inhabitants of said townships shall have the power 
to unite together for school purposes, and select the site or 
sites for school houses, and to use their surplus funds for the 
creation of a suitable building for a high school for the use 



175 

of both of said townships. They may purchase suitable li- 
braries and apparatus ; and employ suitable teachers for such 
school or schools; they may arrange among themselves in 
respect to the number of children sent, and money furnished 
by each township."' 

The above quotation is the earliest piece of legislation 
that has been found for the creation of a township high 
school. It should be noted that the high school thus to be 
established was so ordered by a special charter rather than a 
creation of the free school law. Also, a few years later, the 
inhabitants of Princeton took the customary recourse of spe- 
cial charter organization: 

''All territory now included within the boundaries of the 
township of Princeton, in the county of Bureau * * *, 
together with such territory as hereafter may be added 
thereto, be and is hereby established a coinmon high school 
district, to be known as the Princeton High School District." - 

The period for special charter legislation, however, ended 
about 1870 and the legislature incorporated the township high 
school plan in the general school law^ of 1872. Under the pro- 
visions of that law which has been amended from time to 
time as necessity seemed to require, seventy-one township 
high school districts are now in existence. 

Only two districts were organized by a law of 1905 which 
was enacted with the expectation that more elastic provisions 
for township high schools had thus been created. In 1911, a 
law was passed w^hich sought to make the establishment of 
community high schools possible. Since the Supreme Court 
declared the last law unconstitutional, in 1916, after one hun- 
dred ninety-one schools had been organized by its provisions, 
the legislature enacted the law of 1917 which contains some 
of the most prominent features of the legal foundation for 
secondary education in Illinois today. 

By the provisions of the five above named distinctive 
to^vnship laws, a variety of high school districts were legal 
and have been established: - 

1. About half of the township districts in Illinois at the 
present ti me follow the lines of the congressional township. 

1 Sess. Laws, 1857, p. 1136. 
= Sess. Laws. 1867. v. 3, p. 18. 



176 

2. Two or more adjoining townships could establish a 
high school. 

3. Two or more adjoining districts were permitted to 
have a township high school organization. 

4. Parts of adjoining townships were allowed to organize 
for township high schools. 

5. The remainder of a township not included in a town- 
ship high school district could form a township high school. 

6. A school district with a population of at least two 
thousand might organize in township form. 

7. A city with not less than one thousand or more than 
a hundred thousand inhabitants could use the township basis 
for school purposes. 

8. If a township were divided by a navigable stream and 
there were a political town on each side, both in. the same 
township, each toMm could organize as a separate township 
high school district. 

9. The inhabitants of any contiguous and compact terri- 
tory, whether in the same or different townships, might estab- 
lish a township high school. 

10. The law of 1917 includes the whole State as high 
school territory, either in the form of districts already main- 
taining high schools, or non-high school districts which must 
pay the tuition of their pupils in districts that do support 
high schools. 

From these indicated territorial bases for the establish- 
ment of to\\Tiship high schools, it is at once evident that the 
surveyed congressional township is by no means the sole 
factor in the size of the high school districts. About half of 
the districts are determined by township lines; some follow 
the practice provided for in the laws of 1841, which permitted 
townships or fractional townships to form one school district ; 
others follow the old method of uniting districts which began 
to be legally recognized about 1850; still others are similar 
to the general law of 1872, which permitted the city board of 
education to be elected when the population of the district 
reached two thousand. Finally, the distinctive new features 
have obliterated formal boundary lines so that the basal dis- 
trict is that of a community which is able to maintain an 
efficient school. 



177 

At any rate, the larger district for township organization 
has made it possible to supply the financial resources req- 
uisite to the education of the children of the district more 
adequately than can be done in smaller districts. Not only is 
the unit of taxation larger, but the township has the legal 
ri.o-ht to levy the full rate of taxation for secondary education 
which is allowed in other districts for both elementary and 
secondary education. Thus twice the amount of money can 
be raised in the same unit for high schools under the town- 
ship organization, as can be raised in the_ same unit for 
secondary education under district organization. 

Therefore, township high school organizations should be 
superior because they are able to pay higher salaries which 
command better qualified teachers, and because they can 
furnish superior equipment in buildings and grounds. The 
secondary educational opportunities for the children are 
thereby increased. But a disadvantage has arisen because of 
the separation and the lack of articulation between the ele- 
mentary and the secondary schools under township organiza- 
tion. A closer unification among all the schools of the town- 
ship was contemplated by the organizers and advocates of 
the township idea about the time when the charters were 
given to school districts.^'' 

School Districts Under Special Charter. 

It has been shown that a great many academies were 
chartered by special and separate acts of the Illinois legisla- 
ture even in spite of the general corporation laws that were 
on the statute books at the same time. A similar practice has 
prevailed in relation to the common schools. When villages 
were incorporated some provisions were made for the estab- 
lishment of education, and occasionally special charters were 
granted for the creation of certain school territory m and 
near the town itself. 

The boundaries of school districts from 1850 to 1870 were 
almost continually changing, sometimes because better educa- 
tional opportunities could be provided, at other times, be- 
cause quarrels ensued over such questions as the levying of 

2a Mr Edwards gave a thorough exposition of the arguments for township 
organization in 1855 Mr. Bateman and other leaders have since restated Mr. 
Edwards' arguments. 



178 

taxes, the employment of teachers, and the location and con- 
struction of buildings. One outgrowth in the change of dis- 
trict lines was the recognition of some of the united territory 
by the legislature. Some of the special charters thus granted 
conferred powers on the new districts that were in opposition 
to the free school laws. In several cases, the right to ascer- 
tain the qualities of common school teachers and certificate 
them was taken from the county superintendent, a power con- 
ferred on him by general law, and bestowed on the board of 
education for the new district."** Moreover, the law of 1859 
stated that no teacher should be paid out of the State funds 
unless he received a certificate from the county superintend- 
ent. However, the special legislation granted the districts 
with charters the right to receive their share of the school 
money. 

According to Supt. Etter, "in many of these districts 
there is not even an examination as to the qualifications re- 
quired, and persons are employed to teach without authority, 
and in direct violation of the plain provisions of school law".^ 
He continued to say that several refused to return school 
statistics in the proper m'anner or even at all. 

Although some districts tried and did evade the free 
school principle under special charter which granted the 
board the right to fix the rate of tuition in public schools,^^ 
nevertheless all of them had a larger district than was com- 
mon and many of them provided and carried into execution 
the plans for free schools of all grades. Besides, the free 
education of all the youth from six to twenty-one was to be 
provided in higher as well as primarj^ schools whose length 
of term was quite above the average of the six months re- 
quired by the law of 1855. Among some of the very early 
high schools of the State were those districts with special 
charters. For instance, Springfield, Galesburg, Lacon and 
Lee Union Center had high schools established before 1860. 
Finally, the board under special charter was given the au- 
thority to levy a tax on the whole district, but the rate of 
taxation was limited by the terms of the charter. 



^ See Decatur, Charleston. Kickapoo and Paris special charters. 
'State Supt. Report, 1875, p. 141. 
** See Galesburg charter. 



179 

Since most of these districts under special charters, given 
about the Civil War period, have materially changed in 
economic and social conditions, the annulment or the amend- 
ment of the charters, to meet the demands of present day 
secondary education would be advantageous. For instance, 
the maximum tax rate of one per cent on the district may be 
no longer justifiable. Some of the cities with old charters 
have cast them aside in order to make more modern organiza- 
tions, but in 1906, thirty-seven districts still remained. 

School Districts Established by General Law. 

The free school law of 1855 gave a decided impetus to the 
development of common schools that were in operation at the 
time of its passage, and made it possible to create new in- 
stitutions that were free, either directly as common schools 
or indirectly by the reorganization of academies and select 
schools : 

''It is highly gratifying to be able to state that, while 
a considerable number of these institutions are still in opera- 
tion in various portions of the State, two-thirds of those in 
existence two years since have given place to the Public 
Schools, or been themselves transformed into Union Graded 
Schools, under the latv * * * Scarcely two years have 
elapsed since the Free School System went into operation in 
this State, and in that brief period it has nearly swept the 
entire field of the thousands of Private Schools which then 
existed." * 

The number of union graded schools that were reported 
for 1862 was 402, but it was unreasonable to expect that all 
of that number were thoroughly graded on the basis of 
scholarship and attainment so that each of them had a higher 
department of a secondary nature. ' ' That very many of them 
are organized and conducted on the true basis, is certain, as 
I know from personal observation. We have graded schools 
which in their principles of instruction, are not surpassed 
by those of any other state within my Imowledge. ' "^ Superin- 
tendent Bateman continued by saying that many schools 
adopted the title of union graded schools that were unworthy 
of the name. 



* state Supt. Report, 1857-8. p. 16. 
'State Supt. Report, 1861-2, p. 21. 



180 

The terms, common school, graded school, or union 
graded schools, were used by State Superintendents in their 
reports from 1855 to 1867 without making any distinction 
between elementary and high schools. At the latter date, 
Mr. Bateman stated ''that one or more advanced schools, or 
high schools or departments, have been established in nearly 
every county of the State ".** The number of public high 
schools reported for 1869-70 was 108, around which figure 
the variation was slight for a period of ten years or so, be- 
cause the standards for classification and the conception of 
what a high school ought to be were continually changing : 

''The report of high schools for 1880 shows apparently 
a smaller number than in 1878; but the difference is due to 
the fact that I asked that only those schools should be classed 
as high schools which had a regular course of high school 
study of three or four years' duration — a course that was 
actually taught to the pupils in the school. As a result of this 
request, one county that in 1878 reported seven high schools, 
in 1880 reported none; another county changed from twelve 
to three; another, from seven to two." ^ 

At this point it will be valuable to look at the district 
system which had grown to be very pernicious by 1870. The 
previous laws allowed the toA\Tiship trustees to district the- 
territory although the inhabitants in the township had a 
permissive voice in fixing boundaries. At one extreme were 
the trustees, at the other, the district directors with no author- 
ity in determining the size of the district. Frequently one 
set of trustees would make large districts so that all grades 
of a common school could be supported. A succeeding board, 
some member of which living in the large district was wealthy 
and had no children, Avould cut the district in two and ruin the 
higher schools. In the continually changing districts, terri- 
tory of all sizes was included from those that were large to 
those that were so small that a single family had a whole 
district all to itself.^ 

The law of 1872 took away the right of township trustees 
to district the territory at will and gave the district directors 
the independent right to consolidate districts in contiguous 



« state Supt. Report, 1867,1868, p. 127. 
'State Supt. Report, 1879. 1880, p. 92. 
•State Supt. Report, 1865, 1866, p. 81. 



181 

territory. Moreover, the general assembly recognized the 
necessity for otlier provisions for secondary education than 
those made for toA\Tiship high schools and districts with 
special charters by incorporating in the law of 1872 the sec- 
tions which gave a community the right to elect an indepen- 
dent board when the population numbered two thousand. The 
board was expressly given the power to provide free schools 
of all grades for at least six months in such a district. 

From 1872 on to about 1890, it was quite common to have 
superintendents report that districts in their towns had con- 
solidated and one central high school established for the en- 
tire district. Also, about the same time, high schools began 
to be established in districts under the control of district 
directors. These institutions were not as well established 
nor as thorough as the high schools established under town- 
ship organization or under union districts with special char- 
ters, or in cities or villages with boards of education. The 
legality of high schools in all of these districts is considered 
next. 

Legal Decisions. 

Free public high schools may be said to have been firmly 
established in Illinois when the Supreme Court affirmed the 
constitutionality of certain sections of the school law that re- 
ferred to high schools, either directly or by implication: 
* ' The legislature of the State has the power to enact any and 
all laws proper for the government and wellfare of the people 
of the State not prohibited by the constitution of the United 
States, or of this State. "^ 

Now the constitution of the State of Illinois, adopted in 
1870, gave the legislature the right to provide for a system 
of free common schools : ' ' The General Assembly shall pro- 
vide a thorough and efficient system of free schools, whereby 
all the children of this State may receive a good common 
school education. ' ' ^° 

But in the case of Richards vs. Raymond it was main- 
tained that a tax could not be collected for the support of a 
township high school because such a school was outside of 
the meaning of the term, free common school. In that de- 



• Richards vs. Raymond. Supreme Court Rep., v. 92. lU. p. 612. 
"Constitution of 111., 1870, Art. 7. Sec. 1. 



182 

cision, the Supreme Court affirmed the decision of the Ap- 
pellate Court in the following clear and decisive manner : 

'A school of this character is certainly a free school, 
within the meaning of the constitution. That free schools 
may be graded and classified so that scholars that may be 
more advanced in their studies may not be hindered or de- 
layed in the progress of their studies by others, would seem 
to be within the spirit of the constitution, that contemplates 
the creation of a thorough and efficient system of free schools. 
That one may be denominated a high school and another in 
the same township a district school, cannot affect the question 
in the least." 

'But the argument is that the school established is not a 
common school or a school where the children of the State 
may receive a good common school education, and hence in- 
hibited by the constitution. No definition of a comm.on school 
is given or specified in the constitution, nor does that in- 
strument declare what course of studies shall constitute a 
common school education. How can it be said that a high 
school is prohibited by the constitution and not included 
within the definition of a common school! The phrase, a 
common school education, is not easily defined. One might 
say that a student instructed in reading, writing, geography, 
English grammar and arithmetic, had received a common 
school education; while another who had more enlarged 
notions on the subject might insist that history, natural phi- 
losophy and algebra should be included. It would thus be 
almost impossible to find two persons who would in all re- 
spects agree in regard to what constituted a common school 
education. ' ' 

''Indeed, it is a part of the history of the State, when 
the constitution was framed, that there was a great want of 
uniformity in the course of study prescribed and taught in the 
common schools of the State. In the larger and more wealthy 
counties, the free schools were well graded and the course 
of instruction of a high order, while in the thinly settled and 
poorer counties the old district system was still retained and 
the course of instruction prescribed was of a low 
order." * * * 

"But * * * while the constitution has not defined what 
good common school education is, and has failed to prescribe 



183 

a limit it is no part of the duty of the courts of the State to 
declare * * * what particular branches of study shall con- 
stitute a common school education. That may be, and doubt- 
less is, a proper question for the determination of the legis- 
lature, and as a law has been enacted by it which does not 
appear to violate the constitution, it is not the province of the 
courts to interfere." * * * 

''If the law was constitutional, then the levy and col- 
lection * * * of a tax to maintain the school was proper, 
although the course of study prescribed was different from 
that contemplated by law. " '' 

In considering the law relative to the course of study m 
the common school, one section of the law of 1845 gives the 
course of study a secondaiy scope: "No school shall derive 
any benefit from the public or town fund unless the text- 
books used in said schools shall be in the English language: 
Provided, that this section may not apply to those who may 
desire to study any foreign language in said school for the 
purpose of learning the same.'"- 

The amendment to the school law in 1865 farther en- 
larged the right to teach secondary subjects in the common 
school. After listing elementary subjects, the law said, "that 
nothing herein contained shall prevent the teaching in com- 
mon schools, of other and higher branches than those enu- 
merated in this section.'"^ 

In the case of Rulison vs. Post, the Supreme Court de- 
cided that the phrase, "other and higher branches", vv^as 
within the jurisdiction of the common school directors : ' ' We 
are, therefore, clearly of the opinion that the General As- 
sembly has invested school directors with the power to com- 
pel the teaching of other and higher branches than those enu- 
merated, to those willing to receive instruction therein, but 
has left it purely optional with parents and guardians 
whether the children under their charge shall study such 
branches. ' '^* 

In another decision, the same judicial body said that in 
determining the subjects to be taught in the common school, 

"Sess. Laws. 1S45. p. 64. Sec. 58. 

"Sess. Laws. 1845. p. 64. Sec. 58. 

"Ibid. 1865, p. 121. Sec. 18. 

" Rulison vs. Post, Supreme Court Rep., v. 79. p. 567 



184 

the school directors thereby had the constitutional right to 
determine what subjects constituted other and higher 
branches. To the court it was clear that the subjects taught 
in the high school must be founded upon and more advanced 
than the subjects that were taught in the elementary school; 
otherwise, the high school defeated the purpose for which it 
was created. ''Here, then, in the powers of common school 
directors, is the power to decide what branches of study shall 
be taught in the high school, what text-books shall be used, 
and to prescribe necessary rules and regulations for the man- 
agement and government of the school. "^^ 

Finally, the Supreme Court decided that it was constitu- 
tional for the officers of cities to levy taxes for the support of 
common schools under the provision of the general law. ^'^ 

Thus, the court decided that the constitution recognized a 
graded school as a free common school. A high school then, 
as the upper part of the graded school, which had been rec- 
ognized more or less since 1855, was within the spirit of the 
constitution. Moreover, what constituted a good common 
school education would be determined from the practice of 
communities: the wealthier supporting elementary and higher 
schools, the poorer, only the primary schools. Since all 
grades of the common school were in existence at the time of 
the adoption of the constitution which made the establishment 
of a good common school system mandatory on the legislature, 
the assembly acted within its rights in allowing localities to 
levy a tax for the support of high schools. 

Older laws gave a legal basis for the subjects of study in 
high schools. The latter must teach subjects more advanced 
than the elementary schools else it defeated the purpose of its 
creation. Although many other litigations have occurred as to 
the legality of the high school, these decisions may be said 
to have given that institution its first judicial standing in Illi- 
nois as a part of the free common school system. 

Not only have these decisions affirmed the legality of the 
high school as the upper part of the graded common school 
system, but they have been at least one factor in the growth of 
secondary education from about 1880 to 1900. The report of 



*° People vs. Martin Van Allen, Supreme Court Rep., 1877, p. 307. 

1« HiiT-iT-orvio r<(iiir(- T?or> \r SQ n 907 



' Supreme Court Rep., v. 89. p. 297. 



185 

the state superintendent for 1869-70 listed one hundred eight 
high schools but did not classify them. About the same num- 
ber were reported for 1880 but the number was doubled at the 
end of the next decade and increased about thirty-three per 
cent by 1900. The greatest early increase in high schools was 
represented by those districts with special charters. The most 
rapid development from 1880 to 1900 has taken place in cities 
and villages with boards of education. The following table 
shows that comparative growth in high schools since the legal 
decisions that have been cited were made : 

Years 1880 1891 1900-02 

Township high schools 6 9 21 

Special charters 33 43 34 

General law— board 47 137 212 

General law — directors 24 34 71 

Total 110 223 338 " 

Likewise, the list of accredited high schools has rapidly 
developed. In 1877, when the policy of accrediting began, six 
high schools were so recognized; in 1900, there were two hun- 
dred thirty such institutions. ^® 

A summary of the establishment of the free public high 
school shows that it developed from township organizations, 
districts imder special charter, and general school laws. The 
earliest legislation for township organization for high school 
purposes was enacted in 1857. Princeton followed in 1866, 
and the school law of 1872 contained the township plan. The 
township law^s of 1905, 1911 and 1917 were enacted for the 
purpose of making township high schools easier of establish- 
ment. By the provisions of these distinctive acts, a variety 
of high school districts have been legalized and established. 
A somewhat superior organization in comparison with the 
ordinary district has been possible through the township 
plan which began when the policy for granting special char- 
ters for union school districts was common. 

Following the precedent of granting charters to acad- 
emies by special enactments, the legislature, to 1870, in spe- 

" state Supt. Reports,. 1879-80. 1891-92. 1900-02. 
"State Supt. Reports, 1900, p. 76. 



186 

cial acts sanctioned the creation of certain independent school 
districts which, in spite of the occasional violation of the gen- 
eral school law, established high schools comparatively early. 
Since many of the districts with special charters have materi- 
ally changed in social and economic conditions, the amend- 
ment or annulment of these charters would be beneficial. 

The law of 1855 hastened the creation of common schools, 
but made it possible for private institutions to become public. 
In the more advanced, thickly populated, and w^ealthier com- 
munities, the upper part of the union graded schools con- 
stituted the high school, although the latter term was not used 
denotatively by State Superintendents until 1867, when about 
one hundred institutions were reported. The number of high 
schools that were reported increased very slowly for a decade 
because the standards of what was, or should be, high schools 
were rapidly changing.', However, general provision was 
made, in 1872, for the creation of an independent board, when 
the population of a community reached two thousand, with 
the power to levy a tax on property to support free schools 
of all grades. 

The free public high school may be said to have been 
established in Illinois when the Supreme Court decided that 
certain sections of the laws of 1872 and 1874, which referred 
to the common and high schools, were constitutional. A 
township high school was a free school, it was a part of the 
common school, and a tax for its support was constitutional 
in the judgment of the highest court. Directors were within 
the limits of the law in requiring and determining what con- 
stituted ' ' other and higher branches ' '. Moreover, taxes that 
were levied in cities for the support of common schools were 
legal, but no litigation over the high schools was found, where 
the system had been established under special charter. 



187 



CHAPTER XIV. 



A Summary of Some Earlier Influences Affecting Later 
Development and Practice. 

The earliest attempts to establish schools in Illinois were 
wholly individualistic; even the policy of the State to the 
middle of the nineteenth century was that of laissez faire. 
Generally, provisions of various kinds were made for acad- 
emic and common education, but the carrying into effect of 
most of these provisions was left almost entirely to individual 
will and caprice. Democracy was conceived as a plan of 
action whereby each person did as he pleased. 

In contrast to that attitude, socialization is more nearly 
characteristic of the present plan for secondary education. 
The State has developed a definite policy of making that edu- 
cation possible for all the youth, since the whole State has 
been made high school territory, either in the form of non- 
high school districts that are required to pay the cost of a four- 
year secondary education, in high school areas, or districts 
that maintain acceptable institutions. Moreover, territorial 
limits, instead of following certain surveyed or customary 
lines, are conceived in terms of a community that has suffi- 
cient assessable property, and enough prospective pupils to 
support an efficient high school. Illinois is pre-eminent in the 
advance that the com'munity high schools are making. But 
the State will have taken another important step w^hen it 
requires that all the children Avho can profit from secondary 
education are in school. Then will the democratic ideal of 
equality of opportunity begin to function more truly. 

As the State has developed organizing and administrative 
functions, the position of the church in relation to public 
education has changed. The colonial Latin grammar school 
was a sectarian institution, but the academy divorced the 
church from the denominational aspect, so that, while the 



188 

latter was founded in many instances by the church, its pupils 
were freed from subscribing to any creed, mode of worship, 
or religious test. Thus the academy was the transition in- 
stitution between the denominational colonial Latin grammar 
school and the secularized public school. From the discussion 
of the academy in Part I, both the religious and semi-public 
aspects in the founding, management, and support of the 
academy have appeared. When the State in its development 
had reached the point of public support of education, the 
cardinal principle of the complete separation of the church 
and the State was essential. 

A necessary feature of free public education is that the 
wealth of the State shall pay for the education of the children 
of the State. The academy, of course, was supported by the 
sale or rents of public land, interest from the common school 
fund, endowments, and tuition. The public domain in Illinois 
has practically disappeared but the common schools today 
receive their share of a fund that was created in part by the 
conditions laid down by Congress for the admission of Illinois 
in the Union. Although subsequent provisions have been 
made for the increase of the fund, Illinois, as most other 
states has not shoAvn that she really believes in providing the 
greatest opportunity for her children, because the rate of 
state taxation has remained practically the same since the 
enactment of the free school law of 1855. Of course the value 
of property has constantly increased but probably at a less 
proportion than the growth of the needs of the school. Be- 
cause a two mills state tax was levied in 1855 on property, is 
no justification for the same rate and method of taxation in 
1919. 

Property in land as a basis for taxation was more equit- 
able when land was easily obtainable by all. Eeal estate was an 
acceptable index of wealth, but to use that as the principal 
method of taxation today, exempts large quantities of wealth 
in other forms. No logical reason exists to place an increas- 
ing burden on the rural districts. For that reason, if for no 
other, a legislature controlled by agricultural interests strives 
to prevent the increase in taxation. 

More progressive kinds of taxation, such as that levied 
in proportion to one's ability to pay, would make it possible 



189 

to raise enough money so that no maximum rate for either 
state or locality need be written in the law. Hence a larger 
local fund could be raised for educational purposes, and more 
state money would be available for distribution. 

Illinois still cherishes the out-worn principle of distribut- 
ing funds according to the school population. The law of 
1855 inaugurated a policy of so distributing the state tax and 
common school fund that the less able communities would be 
aided by those who were more able to pay, but it was repealed 
because the rate of assessment was so unequal in each dis- 
trict, and the wealthier sections wanted their state school tax 
returned to their own districts for their own schools. It is 
entirely conceivable that certain sections in some parts of 
southern Illinois have found it impossible to provide both 
elementary and secondary education at all equal to that which 
has been provided in the central and northern districts of 
the State. The latter territory should be taxed by the State 
and the money so distributed that the children of the former 
will have a more equitable opportunity. 

The abolition of individual tuition payment for non- 
resident pupils in high school areas as provided by the law of 
1917 is a partial equalizing of opportunity for secondary edu- 
cation. The academy and the common school usually received 
fees before the free school of 1855 made taxation mandatory 
for the support of the latter and permitted the former to re- 
organize as a public institution. Even then, there were in- 
stances in which tuition was charged for secondary education. 
Galesburg received a special charter in 1859 which allowed 
the city council to fix the rate of tuition. For a few years 
charges were made, so it was said, not to unnecessarily com- 
pete with the college academy in town. 

At least any school district was permitted to charge tui- 
tion for non-resident pupils. Such cities as Springfield, 
Peoria and Jacksonville made tuition charges for non-resident 
pupils as soon as the free school law was in operation. Until 
recently, pupils who lived outside of a school district paid 
their own tuition in other districts unless their own district 
consented to pay the rate demanded by the board where the 
pupil was attending school. Legal residence rather than the 
ownership of property was necessary to entitle one to free tui- 



190 

tion, although children that were apprenticed could claim free 
tuition in the district in which the man to whom they were ap- 
prenticed lived. 

In 1913, a law was enacted that provided for the payment 
of the tuition of high school pupils by the district in which the 
pupil lived to the district where the pupil attended high 
school. That law was superceded two years later by a law 
which allowed the tuition to be paid out of the distributable 
fund by the county superintendent before the money was ap- 
portioned to the county. Finally, the law of 1917 required 
that the non-high school territory of the State shall pay the 
tuition of their pupils to the district where a high school is 
maintained. So far as the State as a whole is concerned, indi- 
vidual tuition payment has been entirely abolished. 

Many of the ideas in relation to education that have been 
conceived at an earlier date have taken a long time to realize 
in practice. The manual labor aspect of the academies pur- 
ported to m.ake education economically possible, as well as to 
give the pupils an intelligent understanding of agriculture 
and industry so that they could perform these pursuits more 
advantageously in later life. But it was not until 1877 that 
much the same arguments began to be cited in favor of man- 
ual training in high schools. The educational leaders divided 
on the question as to whether manual training ought to be a 
cultural or a vocational subject of study. At the present time, 
all degrees of these two ideas are mingled but the mixture is 
clarifying somewhat in that the junior high school is taking 
the ground that it should provide an opportunity for a large 
range of vocational subject matter in order that the pupil may 
better understand the constitution of social life; while the 
senior high school is maintaining that it should provide voca- 
tional training along the line for which the pupil is fitted 
mentally and socially. Some of the high schools in Illinois are 
beginning to realize these two conceptions. 

Other schools have progressed only a little beyond the 
conceptions underlying the aim of secondary education in the 
earlier periods. The colonial Latin grammar school existed 
in order to give the ministerial class advanced education in 
preparation for college. The academy was partly a protest 
against that idea so that the lawyer, for instance, found an op- 



191 

portunity for the study of his profession. However the acad- 
emy ministered to the wants and needs of the upper middle 
and wealthier people in Illinois. The common school system 
was a demand by the people for equal rights in education. It 
found its aims and wants similar, hence it must furnish the 
same advantages to the public. Therefore, in the earlier years 
of the high school, programs were copied from the academy. 
The languages, mathematics, some science and history formed 
the center of the curricula which were designated as classical, 
general, English and English classical. The subject matter 
offered in the high school programs emphasized the idea of 
formal discipline but a justification for the same material in 
the high schools now must be based on a different psychology. 

The examinations in many of the high schools have shown 
also little development from formalism. In fact, the method 
of examination in numerous academies and some of the older 
high schools had some of the advantages that the present high 
school examinations have lost. It is true that part of the ex- 
amination was rigorous, but there was the frequent oppor- 
tunity for the patrons to come in contact with the work of the 
school. A stimulus was given to the pupils, while the parents 
learned the needs of the school. Many of the examination 
days were occasions for social gatherings which are fre- 
quently omitted now. The parents met at the picnic dinner 
and mingled in a friendly way such as the social center move- 
ment is trying to advance. The high school must be a func- 
tional institution in the community where it exists, or like the 
grammar school and the academy,* it will be superceded bv an 
institution more in consonance with the life about it. 

The academy was unable to reach all of the people, and 
as a class institution it had to give way to a school for the 
people. It had, however, a distinct relationship to the com- 
mon school in preparing teachers, and the normal school is its 
successor m that respect. A bill of 1835 attempted to set up a 
state system of county normal academies for the preparation 
of teachers for the common schools. Some academies were in- 
stituted, advertised, and designated as places where pros- 
pective teachers could be trained. One of the arguments in 
favor of the union graded school was that it prepared teachers 
for the lower departments. County superintendents and 



192 

teachers' conventions urged the formation of higher schools 
for teachers. The State created the first normal school in 1857 
and others since, as well as making it legal, in 1869, for the 
establishment of county normal schools. 

But the high schools seem never to have lost the idea. 
Chicago created a department in the high school in 1856 for 
the instruction of teachers. That course continued in the same 
institution for several years and then was separated and en- 
larged into the Chicago Normal School. Little evidence ex- 
ists that the movement found more than a scholastic encour- 
agement in the high schools over the State until the last two 
decades. One was supposed to be well qualified to teach the 
common branches if he had the additional training of the high 
school. Township high schools have recently taken a real in- 
terest in preparing rural teachers. Those institutions are 
better able to assume the function of preparing rural teachers 
than the city high schools whose problems are different. 
Therefore, the State might subsidize teacher training courses 
in certain designated to^vnship high schools in order to en- 
courage and develop this movement that has begun to func- 
tion more satisfactorily for the country districts. 

A reorganization, however, is needed for the county edu- 
cational department. When Illinois was admitted as a State, 
the type of local government adopted was that of a county 
commissioners' court elected at large. One of the commission- 
ers had the important function of supervising the public land 
of the county, as school commissioner, therefore, his func- 
tions consisted of little else. The office of county superintend- 
ent grew out of the commissioner office. In spite of the sug- 
gestions that the county superintendent supervise the rural 
schools, that officer's functions have remained inspectoral and 
clerical. 

A county board should be elected to represent the people, 
but which has the duty to select a county chief executive offi- 
cer whose business it would be to administer the schools of 
the county as the cit}'' superintendent manages those of the 
city. Instead of the county being supreme in itself, as many 
of the Illinois counties are, it should become a unit in the edu- 
cational administration of the whole State. 

While some superior men have held the office of State 
Superintendent of Public Instruction, and while the duties 



193 

and importance of that office have increased, the same method 
of election occurs as was established by the law of 1855. Po- 
litical election has little educational significance, and political 
prejudices and ideals can be satisfied in the election of the 
governor who should use his appointive power to select a state 
board of education. The most important business of the state 
board would be to appoint a chief executive officer without 
regard to residence, party, religion, race or sex. This officer 
should fill the highest educational position in the State not ex- 
cepting the presidency of the state university. Among the as- 
sistants that the state superintendent appointed should be one 
whose concern would be chiefly with secondary education. 
The entire State, with the county as the educational adminis- 
trative unit, could then be developed according to its needs 
and the interests of any locality. 

With the creation of state and county supervisory units, 
it would be possible to achieve and advance the aims of the 
educational institutes that began in the early history of the 
common school. In the more progressive places, by 1850, in- 
stitutes were held that had a genuine educational significance 
because superior institute leaders conducted local and state 
conventions as schools, rather than as social conventions 
which are held today. Granted the value of the inspirational 
institute, teachers of the elementary and secondary school 
ought to be so organized in their conventions that they could 
be graded and classified according to their needs. The morn- 
ing sessions might be thus organized in classes which actually 
recited. The conductor and teachers would have an oppor- 
tunity to discuss their problems in common. The afternoon 
should be spent in actual study of a problem for the meeting- 
the following morning. An institute so conducted for a week,. 
and the problems so studied, followed up for the year by the 
state and county supervisors, would be a vital force in the ele- 
mentary and secondary education of today. 

Such a plan would involve a closer connection of the 
school with the public libraries and a farther development of 
the school libraries. Some of the earlier academies were to 
perform the function of supplying books to the surrounding 
public. A little later the State attempted to establish school 
libraries but a recent survey has shown that the Illinois high 



194 

schools, to say nothing of the elementaiy schools, are inade- 
quately supplied with library facilities. It is true that stand- 
ards for accrediting have required certain library equipment 
but the development in supplying magazines, newspapers, 
reference books and fiction for secondary education is just in 
its beginning. 

Also, as was suggested in the last chapter, the State has 
just started on the course of disregarding district lines for a 
more reasonable basis for the establishment of high school 
centers. A brighter period is commencing for the sanctity of 
tradition and custom are being called in question. The limi- 
tation of secondary education to four years, the length of the 
school year, part of the subject matter in the curricula, the 
sharp break between the high and the elementary schools and 
much of the school legislation are to be regarded as historical 
accidents, rather than inviolable and sacred principles. 

The history of the secondary institutions, the laws and 
practices that surrounded the academy and the early high 
.school, give an intelligent conception of secondary education 
in Illinois at the present time. Experience thus becomes an 
intelligent guide for future action. 



195 



CHAPTER XV. 



Summary and Conclusion. 

Illinois is an excellent example of a midwestem state that 
was settled by people from the older states of the East and the 
South for the purpose usually, of raising their economic status 
by taking advantage of the relatively free western land. When 
the State was admitted as a member of the Union, the congres- 
sional land grants, the basis of which was created by the 
Northwest Ordinances, were accepted by the people for educa- 
tional purposes. The earliest schools were individualistic and 
sporadic attempts that were attended with meager success in 
a hostile, wilderness country. More concentrated action oc- 
curred when the legislature, beginning in 1818, adopted the 
policy of granting special charters to groups of individuals 
for the creation of semi-public academies. Some of the re- 
quirements were to make it possible for the poor of the com- 
munity to be educated at public expense; other provisions 
looked forward to the time when all classes in the locality, in- 
cluding the girls, should receive free tuition if the funds of the 
institution permitted it. All charters required religious fre^ 
dom, but allowed the administrative board to perform any 
other function that was not contrary to law. The purposes for 
which the academy was established, the form of administra- 
tive organization, and the financial support varied. 

The aims of the academy were to disseminate useful 
knowledge; to give women high intellectual and moral cul- 
ture ; to fit youth for the various duties of life ; to prepare 
teachers for the common schools; to promote science and lit- 
erature; to develop a sound physical body; to act as libraries; 
to establish a system of manual labor, and to educate the 
children of the common man. The manner of election, the 
number, and the term of the trustees followed no general rule, 
although the powers conferred on them were usually those 



196 

that were granted to bodies politic and corporate. The sup- 
port came from the rent or the sale of school lands ; a share in 
the common school fund; gifts; endowments; the sale of 
shares of stock ; and, tuition. 

Much of the machinery that existed for the administra- 
tive organization and supervision of education was found in 
the church. Missionary preachers opened academies in the 
centers of population to educate the youth, as well as to pre- 
pare ministers of the gospel. McKendreean, Alton, and Illi- 
nois Colleges, respectively representing Methodist, Baptist, 
and Presbyterian-Congregational efforts, united their 
strength before the legislature granted them charters. Fol- 
lowing the period of the legislature-church struggle, charters 
were freely given to academies, but many of them were mod- 
eled upon college charters which had shown the unmistakable 
influence of New England and the Yale movement in Illinois. 

The State went little farther than to grant charters to 
groups of individuals for academic purposes, or to recognize 
permissively any unchartered institution that kept within the 
bounds of law. The results were that the standards for admis- 
sion, tuition fees, the length of the school year, and the length 
of the school day were in no sense uniform throughout the 
State. However, the academy did retain the core of subjects 
of the Latin grammar school, around which other subjects 
were added to prepare students for useful and professional 
positions in life. Besides the ancient languages and arith- 
metic, modern languages, more mathematical subjects, some 
social sciences, natural and physical sciences, philosophy, re- 
ligion, cultural and artistic subjects, and manual labor, were 
added. Formal examinations were conducted, at the close of 
each term, by a local committee of prominent men, usually 
ministers, to pass judgment on the efficiency of instruction. 
Occasionally, a farsighted, liberal minded academic principal 
indicated some of the social values of an education. 

A utilitarian educational philosophy was introduced in 
the West by the manual labor movement which maintained: 
that only the useful in schools was valuable; that mental and 
physical work were practicable only when they were united; 
that conjoint mental and physical work were economical be- 
cause time was saved in gaining knowledge and learning a 



197 

trade; that manual labor connected with the schools was far 
superior to hai*mful play; that new and better opportunities 
were opened up through which a living could be made; that 
manual labor connected with scholastic pursuits, above all, 
was democratic, and that the cost of theoretical and practical 
education was within the reach of a larger number. The edi- 
tors, churches, missionary societies, and the early educational 
leaders were convinced of the value of the system that was ad- 
vocated by Neef and Maclure. Consequently, manual labor 
schools were created, and that feature was incorporated in 
several of the literary institutions. Turner followed up the 
idea, enlarged it and made it more specific in his plan for and 
the advocacy of a system of education in which the common 
man would have equal advantages with the professional 
classes. Partly due to his efforts, the Morrill Land Grant Act 
was passed by congress, and the Illinois Industrial University 
was chartered. A decade later, the high schools began to in- 
troduce some features of the manual labor idea in the system 
of manual training. 

The academy was a well established institution in Illinois 
by 1850, Before that date, scarcely any other means existed 
in the State by which a useful, cultural, or professional sec- 
ondary education could be obtained. In spite of the pro- 
nouncements that the academy was a frontier institution in 
which all classes could mingle, it served only a limited number 
of the population who lived near its doors and were able to 
pay the price for instruction. Therefore, the next step in the 
discussion is the role that the common school played in the 
education of the children of the State. 

At the end of the first quarter of the nineteenth century, 
the apprenticeship system of education was dying out in the 
older states of the East and the South. However, the emi- 
grants from the latter had carried that custom to Illinois, ap- 
prenticeship laws had been passed, and indenture agreements 
were made with some white youth and negroes, but the system 
was not as extensive as it had been in the colonial days be- 
cause of the increasing opportunities for education, and the 
growing sentiments of the humanitarian philosophy in the 
rights of all individuals for freedom and equality. 

To provide that liberty, and to insure the permanence of 
free institutions in Illinois, the education of the youth of the 



IDS 

State by means of a system of free common schools, was 
necessary. The law of 1825 provided that a school system 
should be established, that the schools should be free to all 
children, and that the schools thus created should be sup- 
ported by two per cent of all the yearly state revenues, and by 
a local general property tax. Governor Coles was probably 
the author of the bill, rather than Senator Duncan, and drew 
his ideas for a complete system of education consisting of 
primary, secondary and university instruction from Jeffer- 
son's plan, with which he was familiar. The first concern was 
with primary instruction, which the law of 1825 made possi- 
ble. Five free school districts were ordered established in 
Madison county by the county commissioners within a few 
months after the enactment of the law. No complaint was 
made in the Edwardsville paper or in the county court, al- 
though objection must have been marked in some of the other 
counties because the legislature annuled the local tax clause, 
in 1827, and the state two per cent section in 1829. From that 
time, to 1855, common schools in general, were supported by 
the parents of the children who attended the schools. 

The efforts of the educational and political leaders of the 
State were redoubled, after the annulment of the law of 1825, 
in order to create a free common school system. An educa- 
tional survey of Illinois, and the assembling of information 
about educational progress of the eastern states, were the 
bases on which a teacher association addressed the people of 
the State and sent a memorial to the legislature on the subject 
of common schools. The sections of the bill which provided 
for free schools and the establishment of an academy in each 
county for the training of teachers, were defeated. Some of 
the academies did supply a scholastic education for the com- 
mon school teacher, but there was no state supported normal 
school until 1857. Little had been expected of the common 
teacher in qualifications, little of value was returned in the 
way of service, but the wages were equally as good as those 
paid by the older eastern and New England States. 

Four agencies through which the common school was 
aided in its development and in its establishment as a free 
public institution, were notable. 1. Prominent educational 
leaders were: many of the governors; the Illinois College 



199 

group; such editors as Judge Hall, John S. Wright, and 
Charles E. Hovey; the missionary circuit riders, and resident 
ministers ; state superintendents ; legislators ; state agents, and 
a few nationally prominent men in the persons of Jefferson, 
Clinton, Mann and Barnard. 2. Many of the newspapers of the 
State, The Illinois Monthly Magazine, The Common School 
Advocate, The Prairie Farmer, and The Illinois Teacher, 
were the literary means devoted to the cause of the common 
school. 3. Some of the institutions that increased the general 
intelligence of the people, and created a desire for better edu- 
cational opportunities, were: The Ladies' Aid Association 
for the Education of Females; working-men's organizations; 
public libraries ; Sunday schools ; and academies. 4. Enthusi- 
asm, harmony, and co-operation among the friends of the com- 
mon school in the interest of enlightenment, were developed 
by educational convention. 

The legislature partly followed the advice of the Peoria 
Teachers' Convention by creating a State Superintendent of 
Common Schools in the person of the Secretary of State, and 
allowing a tax to be levied for the support of common schools 
in any district where two-thirds of the legal voters so decided. 
The constitutional convention provided, in the first draft of 
the constitution, for the levying of a tax for the maintenance 
of free schools, and appointment of a separate Superintendent 
of Common Schools, but the final draft of the constitution of 
1847, was singularly silent on the subject of education. 

The demands became so urgent that the governor, in 
1854,' appointed a state superintendent whom the legislature 
charged with the duty of providing a bill for the reorganiza- 
tion of the entire common school system. The bill was passed 
in 1855. A state tax of two mills was levied on every dollar of 
property and the income added to the common school fund ; a 
local tax was levied by the trustees of both township and 
district to help maintain at least one free school in every dis- 
trict for six months in the year. The state common school 
fund was distributed in such a manner that two-thirds was 
given to the county on the basis of the number of white chil- 
dren between the ages of five and twenty-one years; the re- 
maining one-third was distributed on the basis of the number 

» See foot-note following reference 13, Chapter XI. 



200 

of townships, or parts of townships in each county. The 
money due the townships was to be distributed in proportion 
to the number of days of school that were actually taught. 

The method of distribution of the state school fund, 
which benefited the poorer sections, as well as the richer dis- 
tricts, was a powerful argument in favor of free schools. Such 
institutions were democratic; they were the means by which 
children could be educated at home; they were located where 
they were needed, and they were inexpensive. Nevertheless, 
the successful academy had superior teachers; they were bet- 
ter equipped, and they had more extensive subjects of study. 
Thus two sharply defined groups existed in the State ; the one 
favored the common school, the other favored the academy. 
At one extreme, the free school was placed in a class with free 
negroes ; at the other, it was eulogized. 

The common school was passing through the process of 
grading in the period under consideration so that it was being 
divided into primary, grammar, and higher departments. 
More of the first were needed, less of the second, and still 
fewer of the last, to serve the educational requirements of a 
community. To facilitate the process of grading, which pro- 
vided better opportunities for the children, the practice of 
joining districts developed in which a higher department 
could serve the entire union territory. The legislature recog- 
nized the right of unionization in legalizing the action of 
certain directors, who had joined their districts, even before 
the free school law made a general provision for grading. 

The high school, usually designated as a part of the 
common school system, thus had one root of its origin in the 
common school. Sometimes, the city council, as in Chicago, 
created a high school as a part of the common school system, 
but for a few years the highest part of the elementary schools, 
overlapped the lowest part of the high school. Neither had 
yet defined entirely its sphere of action. The other main root 
of the high school was in the academy. The latter institutions 
that were especially strong dominated the secondary field for 
several years, even after the free school law was passed be- 
cause they were already in existence, because the conserva- 
tives hated to forsake them for the common schools, because 
many people objected to paying a tax for the education of 



201 

other children than their own, and because they were better 
equipped with superior teachers, apparatus, buildings, and a 
more suitable program of subjects. The weaker academies 
were glad of the chance to reorganize as free schools because 
the means of support was at hand. In the long run, however, 
the academies failed to hold their own with the free public 
high school which was under way before the Civil War. 

A second proof that the common schools were providing 
some secondary education is found in the examination of the 
character of their subjects of study. What were usually 
designated as elementary subjects were taught in the common 
schools, but many instances existed where higher branches 
received equal and even more emphasis. The explanation is 
found in the fact that the academies supplied a great number 
of common school teachers who naturally taught the subjects 
that they had learned in the academy. Moreover, the common 
school took the academy as its pattern; what was considered 
the means of a cultural education in the latter, were equally 
appropriate for the common man's children. Hence the free 
public high school based much of its subject matter on the 
academic program, which was the current secondary practice, 
and which had a distinct philosophy underlying it. 

By 1860 the common schools, as had been suggested in 
the process of gradation, considered that some subject matter 
was more difficult than other material. Before passing to a 
higher department, the next lower one must have been com- 
pleted. Hence the high school required the passing of more 
or less formal examinations as a condition of entrance. 

The law of 1825 which provided for free schools was re- 
pealed a few years later; a second effort was made in 1835, 
for free common schools. After several previous efforts, the 
first relatively permanent free school law was passed in 1855 
by which taxation was mandatory. The common school sys- 
tem, with its upper part, the high school, was supported at 
public expense. 

For a considerable period of time before the passage of 
the free school law, townships were incorporated for educa- 
tional purposes under the control of elected trustees whose 
duty it was to district the township to suit the wishes and 
convenience of the people. The law of 1855, as amended in 



202 

1857, 1859 and 1865, provided for the union of districts whicli 
were to be under the control of a publicly elected board of 
trustees. Since high schools were very likely to have been 
created when districts united, the third distinguishing char- 
acteristic of the free public high school was that it was con- 
trolled by a public board. 

However, several years elapsed before the high school 
in Illinois had defined its sphere of action, and before it had 
grown into the affections of the people. When the Supreme 
Court decisions, between 1875 and 1879, had settled the con- 
stitutionality of certain sections of the school law relative to 
the common school and the high school, the latter institution 
may be said to have been firmly established. The gap had 
been bridged between secondary and common school educa- 
tion. No longer was the academy the institution that pro- 
vided the elementary and secondary education for the wealth- 
ier people ; nor was the common school the institution of the 
poor man alone. Instead of the continuation of the beginning 
of a parallel system of class education, democracy in Illinois 
had made a vertical system in which a ladder extended for all 
from the primary grades to the university. 



203 



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VITA 

The author of this dissertation, Paul E. Belting, was born 
at IlHopohs, Sangamon County, IlHnois, on September 5, 1886. 

He received his early education in the public schools of Illi- 
nois, graduating from the Mattoon, Illinois, High School in 1907. 
He was a student in the Eastern Illinois State Normal School 
at Charleston, Illinois, and upon graduation in 1909 became the 
principal of the Martinsville, Illinois, High School for one year. 
He was a student in the University of Illinois from 1910 to 
1912, from which institution he received the Bachelor of Arts 
degree in 1912. He was principal of the Globe, Arizona, High 
School in 1912-1913, and principal of the Oskaloosa, Iowa, High 
School from 1913 to 1917. He did graduate vv^ork at the Uni- 
versity of Illinois during the summer sessions of 1912, 1916, and 
1917. He was an assistant in games at the Horace Mann School 
for Boys, New York City, and a student in Teachers College, 
Columbia University from 1917 to 1919 and received the Master 
of Arts degree in 1918. 



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